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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION’S 

LICENSING AND RELICENSING PROCESS 

FOR NUCLEAR PLANTS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR 

AND NUCLEAR SAFETY 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND 

PUBLIC WORKS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

JULY 16, 2008 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress.senate 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

BARBARA BOXER, California, Chairman 

MAX BAUCUS, Montana 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York 

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming 

LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri 

BETTINA POIRIER, Majority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

ANDREW WHEELER, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR AND NUCLEAR SAFETY

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware, Chairman 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

BARBARA BOXER, California (ex officio) 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma (ex officio) 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

JULY 16, 2008 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Carper, Hon. Thomas R., U.S. Senator from the State of Delaware ................... 1 

Voinovich, Hon. George, V., U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio ....................... 4 

Lautenberg, Hon. Frank R., U.S. Senator from the State of New Jersey ........... 5 

Craig, Hon. Larry E., U.S. Senator from the State of Idaho ............................... 6 

Sanders, Hon. Bernard, U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont ....................... 9 

Inhofe, Hon. James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma .................... 11 

Johnny, Isakson, Hon., U.S. Senator from the State of Georgia ......................... 14 

Alaxander, Lamar, Hon., U.S. Senator from the State of Tennessee .................. 220 

WITNESSES 

Klein, Hon. Dale E., Chairman, Nuclear Regulatory Commission ...................... 20 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 22 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 32 

Response to an additional question from Senator Carper ............................ 40 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Inhofe ............................... 42 

Jaczko, Hon. Gregory B., Commissioner, Nuclear Regulatory Commission ....... 86 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 88 

Lyons, Hon. Peter B., Commissioner, Nuclear Regulatory Commission ............. 92 

Svinicki, Hon. Kristine L., Commissioner, Nuclear Regulatory Commission ..... 93 

Bell, Hon. Hubert T., Inspector General, Nuclear Regulatory Commission 

Accompanied By: Anthony Lipuma, Deputy Assistant Inspector General 

For Audits Mulley, George, Senior Level Assistant For Investigative Operations ..................................................................................................................... 114

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 117 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 129 

Response to an additional question from Senator Carper ............................ 130 

Response to an additional question from Senator Inhofe ............................. 130 

Christian, David A., President And Chief Nuclear Officer, Dominion Nuclear . 131 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 133 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Inhofe ............................... 143 

Pietrangelo, Anthony R., Vice President, Nuclear Energy Institute ................... 144 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 146 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 158 

Response to an additional question from Senator Carper ............................ 159 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Inhofe ............................... 159 

Webster, Richard, Legal Director, Eastern Environmental Law Center ............ 165 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 169 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 176 

Response to an additional question from Senator Carper ............................ 178 

Romm, Joseph, Senior Fellow, Center For American Progress Action Fund ..... 187 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 189 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 201 

Gilbertson, H. John, Jr., Managing Director, Goldman, Sachs and Company ... 205 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 207 

Response to an additional question from Senator Boxer .............................. 210 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL 

Statement of Eastern Environmental Law Center ............................................... 221 

(1) 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION’S 

LICENSING AND RELICENSING PROCESSES 

FOR NUCLEAR PLANTS 

Wednesday, July 16, 2008 

U.S. SENATE, 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR AND NUCLEAR SAFETY

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m. in room 

406 Dirksen Senate Building, Hon. Thomas R. Carper (chairman of 

the committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Carper, Voinovich, Inhofe, Lautenberg, Cardin, 

Sanders, Isakson, Craig 

STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS R. CARPER, 

U.S. SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF DELAWARE 

Senator CARPER. The Subcommittee will come to order. 

Senator Voinovich and I are pleased to welcome all of you this 

morning, particularly our first panel of witnesses. Thank you for 

joining us. 

Today’s hearing provides oversight on the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission’s licensing and relicensing processes for nuclear 

plants. Senators are going to have roughly 5 minutes for opening 

statements, then we will recognize the Chairman of the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission and each of our commissioners to offer 

their statements to our Committee. 

Chairman Klein is prepared to give us a statement about 5 minutes in duration, and our commissioners, Commissioner Jaczko, 

Commissioner Lyons and Commissioner Svinicki will each have 

about 2 minutes to offer any additional thoughts that you might 

have. 

Following the commissioners’ statements, we will have two 

rounds of questions, and then we will ask our second panel of witnesses to come forward and present and respond to our questions 

as well. 

A number of you, at least three of our witnesses on this first 

panel, Senator Voinovich, Senator Craig, have been before us any 

number of times. One of them looks, I don’t recall seeing one of the 

commissioners on the other side of this table before, but I know 

that she is somebody that you have worked with for a long, long 

time, and we welcome you and thank you for joining us today. 

As Americans face tough issues like global warming, like air pollution, a sluggish economy and high energy costs, I believe our 

2 

hearing today on nuclear energy is more than timely. By creating 

a strong nuclear industry we can help reduce our growing reliance 

on foreign oil and unchain our economy from the whims of hostile 

governments. We can also reduce air pollution that damages our 

environment, harms our health and contributes to global warming. 

Nuclear power provides reliable power, and provides it cleanly. 

Unlike fossil fuel power plants, nuclear power plants do not emit 

sulfur dioxide, do not emit nitrogen oxide, do not emit mercury, nor 

do they emit carbon dioxide. Over the past 12 years, the current 

nuclear fleet has prevented emissions into our air something like 

8.7 metric tons of carbon dioxide, 47.2 million tons of sulfur dioxide, and 18.9 million tons of nitrogen oxide. These air pollution reductions equal lives saved. 

A recent statement by the U.S. Department of Energy says that 

by the year 2030, America’s demand for electricity will grow by 

some 25 percent. Nuclear energy is a viable, carbon-free option to 

help meet our growing electricity needs. In these times of increasing unemployment, it is important to remember that the nuclear 

industry provides good jobs for a highly skilled American work 

force. 

A recent Clean and Safe Energy report projected that a nuclear 

renaissance would create about 38,000 nuclear manufacturing jobs 

in the United States. These will be good-paying jobs that could be 

filled by our soldiers coming back home from Iraq and from Afghanistan, or by Americans who have been recently laid off in our 

auto industry. In short, our Country needs nuclear power. And 

luckily, new nuclear power is on the way. 

Over the past few years, my colleague and friend from Ohio, Senator Voinovich—who just celebrated a birthday yesterday—Senator 

Voinovich and I have worked closely, and he doesn’t look any the 

worse for wear, I would say. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. We have worked closely together in this Subcommittee to make the nuclear renaissance a reality, and a lot of 

other people worked with us. I believe we have made significant 

progress. Every day, we are getting closer to seeing a new generation of nuclear power in America. 

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, or the NRC, is now to receive nine license applications for the first reactors to be built in 

this Country, I believe in more than 30 years. And the Commission 

expects several more this year. It is expected that 34 new nuclear 

units may be built in the next 10 to 15 years. 

In addition to these facilities, the current nuclear fleet has increased its capacity and is extending its lifetime through the Commission’s renewable license process. Out of the 104 nuclear facilities currently in operation, the NRC has granted roughly half of 

them an operating extension of 20 years. The other half are expected to request similar extensions. 

However, for the nuclear industry to be truly successful, one 

word is key. I know the commissioners can tell us what that word 

is, and that word is safety. Without a safe nuclear industry, there 

will be no nuclear industry. There will not be the reductions in 

SOx, NOx and mercury and CO2 that I talked about. There will 

not be the 38,000 plus manufacturing jobs that I talked about. 

3 

There will not be the reduction in our dependence on foreign oil 

that we discussed, or other fossil fuels. 

We are only as strong as our weakest link. That is why today’s 

examination of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is so important. 

We called this hearing to discuss the NRC’s licensing and relicensing processes for both old and new nuclear power plants. We 

want to make certain that the NRC has the resources as well as 

the right tools and structures in place to continue to ensure nuclear 

safety. This includes making certain the NRC does not focus on one 

process and forget the other. Getting these processes right is crucial for the nuclear industry to move forward. 

Having said that, I look forward to working with my colleagues, 

certainly Senator Voinovich, who helps to lead this Subcommittee 

and has for some time, and one of our previous leaders in the Subcommittee for many years, Senator Inhofe, who has joined us, and 

Senator Boxer and many others, to continue to ensure the safety 

of the nuclear industry. 

Senator Voinovich. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Carper follows:] 

STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS CARPER, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE

STATE OF DELAWARE

At a time when Americans are facing high food and fuel prices, I believe today’s 

hearing on the Renewable Fuel Standard is an especially timely topic. As many of 

you know, the Renewable Fuel Standard is within the Clean Air Act—and therefore 

under the jurisdiction of this Subcommittee. Although this is the first hearing in the 

Subcommittee on this issue—I assure you, it will not be the last. 

First implemented in the 2005 Energy Policy Act and enhanced in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, the Renewable Fuel Standard is intended to 

promote energy independence and protect the environment. The EPA must implement the Renewable Fuel Standard to meet both these objectives. 

Of course, there are several other critical issues that must be carefully weighed 

when considering the effectiveness of the Renewable Fuel Standard. Increasing energy prices are already placing a strain on families across this Nation. In light of 

growing gas prices, there are a number of things I believe can be done that will reduce financial burdens as well as provide energy security: 

1. I believe that oil and gas companies should drill for oil on the 68 million acres 

of land that Federal Government has provided. In addition, Congress has approved 

opening a 1.5 million acre section off the Gulf of Mexico to new drilling. 

2. The lion’s share of oil produced in the United States should stay in the United 

States. Most of our oil should be sold to Americans and consumed here, not shipped 

overseas. 

3. Our nation must make a stronger commitment to reducing our energy demands 

through conservation and investments in renewable energy alternatives. I also believe we must develop advanced biofuels that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and 

do not divert crops from the food stream. 

Increasing food prices have been blamed on biofuel mandates. From leaked reports to published studies, the impact of biofuel mandates and subsidies on rising 

commodity prices ranges from 3 percent to 75 percent. In truth, we don’t know the 

exact impact on food costs. But we do know that technology is coming online that 

will enable us to produce the biofuels needed to support energy independence and 

reduce greenhouse gas emissions without impacting food prices. 

We must evaluate any unintended consequences of the renewable fuel provisions. 

As academia, government and industry continue to research these effects, this subcommittee will maintain strong oversight. 

Today, however, we will begin to review the methods the EPA will use to evaluate 

the greenhouse gas emissions of biofuels compared to traditional fuels. In addition, 

we will hear testimony about advancements in next generation biofuels. It is important that we take a close look at the State of new biofuels, which will be based on 

feed stocks of waste materials that are not competing with food sources. 

4 

I am excited about the investments and advancements DuPont is making in renewable fuels. And look forward to hearing about the results of the company’s current pilot programs. We need to ensure that facilities to manufacture new biofuels 

and the infrastructure needed to deliver the products to the public will be in place 

to meet the established target of 20 billion gallons of advanced biofuels by 2022. The 

Renewable Fuel Standard makes these new biofuels technologies a viable choice for 

business. 

Ultimately, the Renewable Fuel Standard must be implemented in a way that 

positively impacts the environment and economy. I believe this subcommittee must 

work together to make sure this happens. 

I am grateful to all the witnesses here to today, and look forward to hearing your 

testimony. 

STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF OHIO 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really enjoyed 

working with you and Senator Inhofe on oversight of the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission, and really appreciate the cooperation that 

we’ve received from the Chairman and members of the Commission. We dearly care about what you’re doing and the impact it is 

having on our Country. 

Mr. Chairman, I was back in Ohio over the Fourth of July weekend and talked with folks about high gas prices. They were very 

frustrated at the high cost of gasoline and angry that Congress 

does not seem to be doing anything about it. They told me about 

how the price of gasoline is seriously affecting their lives, from 

their ability to affordably commute to work, to take vacations with 

their family. And because energy prices are a form of regressive 

tax, it is affecting people who live on the financial edge the most. 

Our standard of living in many parts is going down in this Country 

because of the high cost of energy. 

A recent report by the FBR Research estimates that Ohioans 

could spend 13.5 percent of their disposable personal income on 

gasoline, electricity and home heating during the next 12 months. 

Ohioans are contacting me daily with a clear message: increase our 

supply of oil and develop a comprehensive energy strategy. Our 

constituents want us to lead this Country out of this crisis. As a 

Nation, we must work to achieve energy independence, but we 

must do so in a way that balances our environmental objectives. 

What we need is a rational attempt to create a bridge to a carbon-constrained world that will give us the time we need to develop 

technologies that will lead us to a cleaner, energy-independent future without destroying jobs and ruining our competitiveness during the transition. In this context, there is a growing realization 

that nuclear power must play an increasing role in our Country’s 

energy mix. In his recent book, The Age of Turbulence, Adventures 

in a New World, Alan Greenspan writes that nuclear power is a 

major means to combat global warming, and its use should be 

avoided only if it constitutes a threat to life expectancy that outweighs the gains it could give us. By that criterion, he believes that 

we have significantly under-used nuclear power. I think that I 

don’t have to remind folks that we do have 104 nuclear power 

plants operating today. They represent over 70 percent of the Nation’s emission-free generation portfolio, avoiding annually 680 million tons of carbon dioxide, compared with 13 million tons for wind 

5 

and a half million tons for solar. That is a big, big reduction in carbon dioxide. 

To be sure, we must have a greater efficiency, more demand side 

management and more renewable energy, all of which play a role 

in reducing the amount of carbon we emit. But renewable energy 

sources like solar and wind are intermittent and unreliable. The 

fact of the matter is that most of us know that we have to do a 

much better job in terms of increasing nuclear power in this Country. 

It is interesting that the Lieberman-Warner bill, when EPA 

looked at it, said that in order to get the reductions that it anticipated, we would have to have a 150 percent increase in nuclear 

power by 2050. We are talking 150 new nuclear power plants. So 

what we are talking about here today is the license renewal process, and also the new licensing that is going to go on, it is so very, 

very important. I was very pleased to learn that our Committee’s 

efforts have helped the NRC to attract and hire over 1,000 new employees since 2005, with a net gain of over 500 employees after attrition, mostly due to retirement. So you have looked forward to the 

human capital crisis that we have and are compensating for it. 

While the NRC’s new licensing process will be a significant improvement over the old process, a level of health and skepticism remains by virtue of the fact that the new process has not yet been 

tested. We want to find out how you folks think that you are doing. 

Since 2003, we have had eight NRC oversight hearings and over 

a dozen meetings in my office with the NRC Chairman, and now 

Dale Klein. Senator Carper and I are continuing with these meetings since he took over the chairmanship of the Subcommittee. So 

I think all of you know this, that the two of us are dead serious 

about oversight. We care about what you are doing, every aspect 

of it. We had a nice meeting recently with Chairman Klein and laid 

out two or three things that the two of us working together can do 

to help you do your job better. So we are with you and we are anxious to hear from you. 

Senator CARPER. Senator Voinovich, thank you very much. 

We are going to bounce over to the Democratic side here, Senator 

Lautenberg, followed by Senator Craig. Senator Lautenberg, you 

are recognized at this time. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank 

you for enabling me to participate in this Subcommittee hearing, 

even though I am not an official member. I am an official interested party, I can tell you. 

First, it is critical to understand how essential nuclear power is 

to my State. In fact, about half the energy coming into New Jersey’s homes and businesses is nuclear. I can’t help but think about 

a time not too many years ago when nuclear was a dirty word. Now 

we face up to the reality of need and understand that nuclear certainly has a place and a position that will help us in other areas 

of energy resource. 

But everyone understands, though nuclear is so important in 

supply in my State, safety is the largest factor. One can’t help but 

6 

think back to a time when a couple of nuclear plants were built 

with billions of dollars invested and then abandoned because safety 

couldn’t be guaranteed. We don’t want that to happen. 

So we will not trade safety for the sake of meeting our energy 

demands. And that is a, I think, in all candor, that we believe that 

these two requirements are available and should be pursued in the 

name of safety. We need to focus on the licensing and especially the 

relicensing process to make sure that we are not putting any plants 

back online that could put any communities in danger. The NRC, 

or the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, is tasked with overseeing 

this industry. Communities rely on the NRC to strictly enforce the 

rules, make sure that the plants are safe. 

However, the NRC is currently not doing enough to follow the 

rules designed to protect the communities nearby nuclear power 

plants. Last year, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s own Inspector General concluded that the Commission was not performing 

due diligence when it came to license renewals. In particular, the 

IG could not tell whether the NRC actually did its job to audit, review and verify the safety applications it received from the companies. In fact, I quote the Assistant Inspector General, he said that 

‘‘The safety analysis was probably done, it is just that we don’t 

have sufficient evidence to know whether it was or it wasn’t done.’’ 

Mr. Chairman, probably is not good enough. The communities 

surrounding the Oyster Creek facility in New Jersey, the oldest operating nuclear plant in the United States, cannot rely on probabilities. The NRC must do better, the NRC has an obligation to 

conduct real oversight of the Nation’s nuclear plants. 

We also need the Commission to be more responsive to the needs 

and views of the public. New Jersey’s residents have been forced 

to fight just to submit their views on the relicensing of Oyster 

Creek. And no one should have to fight that hard to make themselves heard when there is a nuclear facility in their back yard. 

Mr. Chairman, energy is on everybody’s minds these days. People 

are concerned about how they are going to pay for everything, from 

gas for their cars to electric bills for their homes. But we can’t be 

rushed; we can’t be hasty. We need for the NRC to do its job, put 

safety ahead of speed when it comes to licensing nuclear power 

plants. And we believe that the NRC has the capability to do that 

and urge it to do just that. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you, Senator Lautenberg. 

Under the early bird rule, Senator Craig, you are next. Senator 

Inhofe has asked you to go ahead and speak next, and then we will 

go back to Senator Sanders and then to Senator Inhofe. 

Senator Craig. 

STATEMENT OF HON. LARRY E. CRAIG, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF IDAHO 

Senator CRAIG. Mr. Chairman, again, thank you for holding this 

hearing and allowing me to participate in it. 

I appreciate the commissioners being with us. It is the first time 

as a commissioner that Kristine Svinicki is with us. She was with 

me a good number of years, working on these very issues. So she 

7 

brings to the Commission a variety of talents that I think you commissioners are finding are a great asset to your deliberations. 

Mr. Chairman, I just returned from France and a week with the 

nuclear industry of France, in which a country now receives over 

80 percent of its energy from nuclear. I went to a reprocessing 

plant, I watched a new reactor coming up out of the ground, literally, by construction. I went to a new fuel enrichment plant that 

is being built, a footprint of one of a kind that may be built in 

Idaho. 

While I looked at the physicalness of all around me, most of my 

questions were about public confidence. Because in France today 

there is a high level of public confidence in their nuclear industry 

and in their generating capacity. They not only have a clean fuel, 

they are able to sell a clean fuel to many other countries in Western Europe. 

Now, I have said that to the Chairman, I turned to the Commission. While I have heard the Chairman say and while I have heard 

Senator Lautenberg talk about safety, I see that as only one of 

three key ingredients to the success of a nuclear renaissance in this 

Country. Because a renaissance speaks about growth and revitalization, when in fact, our Country almost killed the nuclear industry. It was a near wipe out, prior to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, 

when we began to put in place procedure again that would allow 

the NRC to do certain things. And for our Country to realize, in 

a time when we wanted clean energy, that there was in fact a clean 

energy source out there, if we could do a variety of things to bring 

it back. 

In fact, in this very room, we have debated climate change, and 

much of that debate was based on the ability to switch to a clean 

energy source, until the Committee found out, and members of the 

Committee found out that clean energy source might not be available or as readily available in a timely fashion in the way that we 

expected it to be. 

Gee, we were going to build 10 or 15 plants just in the next few 

years. Not so, Mr. Chairman, not so at all. There are several factors if that is to happen in the next 20 years. And most of it, in 

part, rests right here with this Commission and these commissioners. Not only is safety a factor, but so is confidence. Confidence 

in the market, confidence in the financial community that what 

this Commission does, they do well, that safety is forefront. But it 

is also confidence that they can proceed in a timely fashion and deliver these plans to the street and these licenses to the street in 

a way that the marketplace can anticipate them with confidence. 

The other side of it is a utility having certainty, certainty that 

the design that they are going to proceed with has the confidence 

of the market and the safety of public acceptance. So it isn’t just 

one factor, Mr. Chairman, in my opinion. It is a multiple of at least 

three. It is confidence, it is certainty and it is safety. 

How do you get confidence? Well, a major utility recently tried 

to site a new greenfield operation in Idaho. Mr. Chairman, a greenfield means it is not being sited near an existing reactor. It is a 

new site, a new reactor. And in my State of Idaho, there is reasonable confidence in the nuclear industry. It is probably a pretty good 

place to site. 

8 

They spent millions of dollars, location, water and walked away. 

The reason they walked away, because of the time line they were 

being told it would take to bring them to license. 

Now, I understand where we are headed, and I understand the 

time it takes to re-gear, to employ, to build the confidence to do the 

right things. And I look at this chart, Mr. Chairman, and I see 

these time lines, way out to 2012 and 2013. And I think this represents maybe four reactor designs. 

What I hope this Committee can achieve, Mr. Chairman, because 

I am not going to be here next year, or any year thereafter, but 

I hope you work very closely with this Commission and you work 

with them not just once a year but maybe twice a year, that you 

achieve a process and a procedure that has the public safety in 

mind, but the confidence of the market and the certainty for the 

utility industry that they have brought about at least three or four 

designs that are there on the shelves. They have been basically licensed as a design. And the responsibility beyond that then is the 

siting. It is the site of integrity: is it geologically sound? Does it 

meet the criteria? Does it satisfy the public? And this should all be 

done in a very open public process. Transparency is absolutely critical. 

Senator Lautenberg said it, confidence, certainty, safety. All is a 

product of transparency and openness. That was the key thing I 

heard in France. When there was a question, they were open, they 

were public about all that they do over there. As a result, over the 

20 years since we left the industry and they picked it up and took 

our technologies and moved them forward to where they are today, 

they have gained that level that we are now attempting to rebuild. 

It is worth doing, Mr. Chairman. It is a great source of energy 

for our Country as baseload. We are going to build a lot of new energies. But this is the one that will fuel the plants, this is the one 

that will turn the lights on of industry. The rest will simply supplement. 

So thank you for holding this hearing. I probably took a little too 

long. But I think for this Commission to understand our urgency, 

but our willingness to be duly diligent, as they will be in the future 

development of a ‘‘renaissance’’ industry, you have to get it right 

this time, and you can, and we know how to do it. 

Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

When I was, I think, a junior in high school, I took a driver’s 

education course. Most of us in the room have taken a driver’s education course. I was in Roanoke, Virginia. And we were coming 

back from our first day out with our driver’s ed teacher, and it was 

one of those cars, I don’t know what it was like for you, but my 

instructor sat to my right hand side, having a steering wheel and 

actually had an accelerator and brakes on his side of the car. 

We were coming back in, pulling back into the lane of my high 

school, the drive-up lane. It was a new high school and the driveway was just being constructed. It was in gravel. As we turned in, 

I was probably going a little faster than I should have for my first 

time out. And I meant to put my foot on the brake and instead, 

as I made the turn onto the gravel drive, I depressed the accelerator, and sheer terror for the other students in the back seat. 

9 

Fortunately, my instructor had the brake, and immediately began 

applying the brake as I applied the accelerator. 

I think as we look ahead to this licensing, new licensing process, 

we have probably one foot on the accelerator but one foot on the 

brake. And we may need both of them. But we need in the end to 

get this right, so if we are going to have the kind of confidence that 

you alluded to, we will be able to move forward. 

Senator Bernie Sanders. Welcome, Senator Sanders, you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF HON. BERNARD SANDERS, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF VERMONT 

Senator SANDERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Perhaps I want to pick up on the issue of confidence, Senator 

Craig was talking about it, and maybe expressed it in a little bit 

different light. It is clear that public safety must be job No. 1 when 

it comes to nuclear power. But I must express serious concerns 

about the aging fleet of 104 nuclear power plants in this Country 

which, in my view, need much more oversight than they are currently getting before we talk about more nuclear power plants. In 

other words, we have to get it right today. 

In fact, I would be willing to bet that most people in our Country 

would be disturbed to learn that the Federal oversight role of nuclear power plants in our Country is currently quite limited in 

scope. And they would be equally upset to learn that Federal regulators rely so heavily on information that they get from nuclear 

power plant operators as part of the whole deregulation effort that 

we have seen since Ronald Reagan. And some of the implications 

that we are seeing in some of our financial markets today I think 

apply to nuclear power as well. 

I think that many people just don’t know what is going on, and 

in my view, it is not what should be going on. But let me use, in 

my State, we have one nuclear power plant located in the southern 

part of the State, in Vernon. Let me use that just as an example 

to illustrate what I consider to be a failure of the NRC when it 

comes to oversight. 

On August 21st, 2007, one of the cells of the cooling tower collapsed. I think we have a photograph of that somewhere, there it 

is. An interesting point is, and I don’t want to alarm people, this 

was not a safety issue. This was not radioactive waste streaming 

out into a river. But that is the reality of what happened on August 

21st, 2007. 

Question: given that reality, was Energy fined? Did they pay any 

penalty for this glaring mistake, which was on the front pages of 

papers all over the State? How much did they pay? To the best of 

my knowledge, the answer is, they did not pay one nickel in a fine 

for that mishap. In fact, as I understand it, a ‘‘non-cited’’ violation 

was issued, which is the lowest level of citation. 

Then on August 30th, 2007, a week later, there was an emergency shutdown involving stuck valves. And then just last Friday, 

just last Friday, on July 11th, there was another problem with the 

cooling towers. This time it is leaking pipes. I think we have another photograph here. 

10 

Again, I don’t want to suggest to people that this was somehow 

a safety emergency. It is not. But this is again what took place in 

my State just last week. And the end result of that is, Senator 

Craig talks about confidence. Do you know what, Senator Craig? 

When people see this, and they find out that a company like Energy gets zero fine, confidence is not terribly high. Because common 

suggests that what we understand in this room, and I had the 

privilege yesterday of talking to both Commissioner Chairman 

Klein and Commissioner Jaczko, who made the point, and I understand it, these are not safety issues. I understand that. But you tell 

that to people that when this is going on, that a quarter of a mile 

away, you have extremely toxic waste, you know what? Peoples’ 

confidence in the ability of that company to run that plant is not 

particularly high. You can spend the rest of your life saying, hey, 

don’t worry about it, this is not a safety issue and people have concerns. And you know what? I share those concerns. It seems to me 

inexplicable that there are no fines attached to this lack of oversight. 

As I mentioned last October, I happen to strongly believe that 

the NRC should broaden its oversight programs, whether it be by 

supplementing the reactor oversight process with independent assessments when called for by a State, similar to what I have called 

for in legislation S. 1008, or by some other means, so that we can 

assure the American public that the nuclear power plants that we 

have aren’t being guarded by the foxes. 

You want confidence? Then these guys are going to have to have 

the power to assure the American people that these plants are absolutely safe. What my legislation would allow is a Governor or 

public utility commission to request an independent safety assessment if they have a nuclear power plant in their State. If a State 

is in the emergency planning zone for a nuclear plant in the State 

next door, they certainly have an interest in these issues as well. 

That is why my legislation will allow them to make the same request. 

Critical times at nuclear plants call for special inspections, both 

to ensure the public safety but also to boost public confidence. 

When a facility is seeing a power up-rate, as was recently approved 

for Vermont Yankee and other plants around the Country, that is 

a critical time. When a nuclear plant is seeking to get 20 more 

years of life in an aging facility, that is also a critical time. Or 

when a nuclear plant has had a history of safety problems, that is 

also a critical time. 

These are the circumstances under which my legislation would 

allow for an independent safety assessment. So getting back to 

Senator Craig’s point, you want confidence? Those are some of the 

things. This does not provoke confidence. 

Let me just move on a little bit. Some of my friends talk about 

nuclear renaissance. I don’t know, I don’t know if anybody in this 

room does know what the future of nuclear power in this Country 

may or may not be. But I do know that we are grossly underestimating the significance of energy efficiency and renewable energy as we attempt to deal with the energy crisis that we currently 

face. 

11 

I could tell you that in my State, when I was mayor, we installed 

in my city of Burlington energy efficiency. And today, in Burlington, 20 years later, we are not using any more electricity than 

we did back then. And frankly, we can go a lot further. That is 

more or less true throughout the State of Vermont. So despite economic growth, if we are serious about energy efficiency, we can cut 

back a great deal on the use of electricity. 

In terms of sustainable energy, I think the potential is just extraordinary. Just last week, I was out in Nevada looking at a thermal solar plant out there. 

Senator CARPER. I am going to have to ask the Senator to wrap 

up. Go ahead and complete your thought. 

Senator SANDERS. I would just suggest that there are people out 

there who think that within 15 years, 20 percent of the electricity 

can come from solar thermal plants alone, excluding photovoltaics, 

which also have tremendous potential. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. Senator Sanders, thank you very much for 

those thoughts. 

Senator Inhofe, and then we have been joined by Senator 

Isakson. 

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA 

Senator INHOFE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Everyone always 

starts off by thanking you for having this hearing, but this time, 

I really mean it. 

Senator CARPER. You mean you didn’t mean it all those other 

times you said it? 

[Laughter.] 

Senator INHOFE. To hear you talk about the needs and the reality of where we are today and what we are going to have to do, 

I associate myself with all of your remarks and those of the Ranking Member, Senator Voinovich. I didn’t realize until I heard your 

opening remarks reminding me that it was over 10 years ago that 

I became chairman of this Committee. I remember at that time we 

actually had Senator Voinovich, who was then Governor Voinovich, 

come down and testify. So a lot of time has gone by, and fortunately, some things are happening now. 

But at that time, we had not had an oversight hearing of the 

NRC in over 10 years. And I suggest to you that you can’t let any 

group, any entity in Government, any bureaucracy, go that period 

of time without having oversight. That is what we are supposed to 

be doing. So immediately after that, we started setting deadlines 

and good things started happening. 

And by the way, you would think there would be a pushback 

from the bureaucracy. There wasn’t. The chairman and every member said, we have been wanting to have oversight for a long period 

of time. Well, that time is here now. 

So anyway, the U.S. electricity demand is projected to grow by 

30 percent by 2030. And within the next 4 years, according to the 

North American Electric Reliability Council, six regions of our 

Country may not have adequate electricity supplies to ensure reliability. We need to have adequate, reliable and diverse energy supVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00015 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
12 

ply to power this great Nation of ours. As has been said by everyone talking so far, all but one, anyway, nuclear is going to have to 

fill a great part of that. 

It was one of you who mentioned that the 104 nuclear plants 

that we have that provide, it was Senator Voinovich, I guess, that 

provide 70 percent of the emission-free, as far as CO2 is concerned. 

But that is still only 20 percent of the whole mix. And now with 

the new president of France, I can say nice things about him, 

France has 80 percent. So I think a lot of good things are happening. We are moving in the right direction. 

Last September, the NRC began to review licenses for new nuclear plants. This is a function the Commission has not performed 

since the 1970’s, with a revised rule that has never been used before. The nature of the situation makes strong leadership by the 

Commission extremely important. I am concerned that the Commission is not providing the policy and schedule guidance necessary for this process to proceed smoothly. 

In 2004, the hearing notice for the LES National Enrichment Facility included a detailed schedule with deadlines for staff to complete various task, and for completion of the hearing itself. The notice also directed the hearing boards to exclude certain issues from 

their consideration, issues that the Commission would address directly. Accordingly, the license was issued in 31 months, nearly exactly the amount of time that was expected in the original schedule, which was 30 months, despite never having previously issued 

a license for a uranium enrichment facility. With the LES review 

as an example of efficient decisionmaking, it begs the question of 

why the same approach is not being used for new plant licensing. 

Hearing notices issued for the current license applications are generic and provide no such guidance or schedule. The NRC staff 

vaguely indicates 1 year for having the hearing process, but readily 

admits uncertainty about the time in the future. Certainty is something we have been talking about in these opening statements. 

Why the Commission is reluctant to ensure schedule discipline for 

including specific milestones in a hearing notice, I don’t know. 

Let me just say this. I really think streamlining is necessary. We 

can do a better job than we are doing now, but we are headed in 

the right direction. The other day we had what I thought was a 

rather thoughtful news conference by T. Boone Pickens, a person 

that I have been honored to know for a long period of time. He 

talks about, you have to keep in mind when we talk about energy, 

we are talking about two almost unassociated, but they are associated, problems. One is the energy crisis in America. We are going 

to have to have energy to operate this machine called America. The 

other is the No. 1 issue with Americans, the price of gas at the 

pump. 

What he was doing was saying, by diverting, although I think 

that perhaps I would choose nuclear over the source he was talking 

about, that would free up natural gas. And with the technology we 

have right now, with liquified natural gas, with compressed natural gas, and the price varies from State to State, but the price in 

Oklahoma for liquified natural gas to run your car is 99 cents a 

gallon. So he is talking about the idea of freeing it up. 

13 

So it just seemed to me that this is the opportunity we have in 

using nuclear to free up some of the other sources until some of 

these really good things we look for in the future, the renewables 

and other opportunities become a reality, we can still bring the 

price down and do our job here in running this machine that we 

call America. 

So I am just glad that this Committee is going to stay hitched 

on a bipartisan basis and make sure this gets done, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Inhofe follows:] 

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE U.S. SENATOR FROM THE

STATE OF OKLAHOMA

I commend Senators Carper and Voinovich for holding this hearing today, continuing the tradition of rigorous oversight that I started when I assumed the Chairmanship of this Subcommittee over 10 years ago. Back then, the nuclear industry 

was preparing to extend existing plant licenses and was very concerned about significant uncertainty in the process, particularly the time involved and the requirements necessary to receive the extension. Since then, as a result of strong oversight 

by this Subcommittee, almost half the fleet has been approved for an additional 20 

years of operation. It is our job to ensure that the Commission is an efficient regulator, true to its mission of protecting public health and safety, but also able to issue 

sound decisions in a timely fashion. 

U.S. electricity demand is projected to grow 30 percent by 2030. Within the next 

4 years, according to the North American Electric Reliability Council, 6 regions of 

our country may not have adequate electricity supplies to ensure reliability. We 

need an adequate, reliable, and diverse energy supply to power this great nation of 

ours and nuclear energy is a vital component. New nuclear plants can’t be built 

within the next 4 years, but we need to ensure that new plants are being developed 

promptly and safely, to meet our growing needs. 

Last September, the NRC began to review licenses for new nuclear plants. This 

is a function the Commission has not performed since the 70’s with a revised rule 

that has never been used before. The nature of this situation makes strong leadership by the Commission extremely important. I am concerned that the Commission 

is not providing the policy and schedule guidance necessary for this process to proceed smoothly. 

In 2004, the hearing notice for the LES National Enrichment Facility included a 

detailed schedule with deadlines for staff to complete various tasks and for completion of the hearing itself. The notice also directed the hearing boards to exclude certain issues from their consideration, issues that the Commission would address directly. Accordingly, the license was issued in 31 months, nearly achieving the Commission’s original schedule of 30 months, despite never having previously issued a 

license for a uranium enrichment facility. With the LES review as an example of 

efficient decisionmaking, it begs the question of why the same approach is not being 

used for new plant licensing. 

Hearing notices issued for the current license applications are generic and provide 

no such guidance or schedule. NRC staff vaguely indicates 1 year for the hearing 

process but readily admits uncertainty about the timeframe. Why is the Commission 

reluctant to ensure schedule discipline by including specific milestones in hearing 

notices? 

Furthermore, key policy questions remain. Will the Commission defer to State 

agencies on determinations of the need for power? Will the Commission require licensees to analyze alternative sites if they have chosen to add a new reactor to an 

existing site? 

The lack of clear schedules and resolution of key issues will compound the growing pains that the Commission and the industry must wrestle with as we end our 

30-year construction hiatus. These are complications we simply can’t afford. The 

Commission’s review of licenses for new nuclear plants must be as efficient as possible WITHOUT compromising safety. Keeping the lights on is fundamental to our 

nation’s energy security and the NRC will undoubtedly play a critical role. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you, Senator Inhofe. 

Senator Isakson, welcome. 

14 

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHNNY ISAKSON, U.S. 

SENATOR ROM THE STATE OF GEORGIA 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much, Senator Carper. I echo 

what Senator Inhofe said, thank you very much, this is a very important and timely hearing. 

I will be very brief in the interest of hearing from the commissioners, except to make one statement and pose one question I hope 

you will give us a response to in your allotted time. 

I am one of those that subscribes to the belief that the solution 

to America’s energy problem lies in a myriad of products, one of 

which is nuclear. Others are solar, others are wind, others are synthetic, others are clean coal. You can’t just pick one favorite and 

say it is the magic bullet. 

But there is no question in my mind that without a robust nuclear energy program for electric energy, we can never get to where 

we need to get in terms of reducing carbon and having reliable energy at an affordable rate for the people of the United States of 

America. To that end, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is in the 

cross-hairs at an interesting time and a propitious time. You have 

received and are getting ready to receive a number of applications. 

The nuclear renaissance that hopefully will happen in the United 

States is going to be triggered by your actions in terms of the processing time and the byproduct of that processing. 

It is critical that you have the resources. So in your remarks, I 

hope you will address this question. First question, do you have the 

resources to meet the demands of these two processes that we see 

in front of us, of the pending and soon to come applications for licensing, No. 1 and No. 2, can you do it in a timely but reliable and 

absolutely committed to safety process? The questions that Senator 

Sanders raised with regard to safety are appropriate questions. 

And the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is the key to ensuring 

that the confidence of the public is absolutely 100 percent in this 

process, so we can really have a nuclear renaissance in this Country that makes a meaningful difference in our current energy dilemma. I will appreciate your addressing that in your remarks 

when you get a chance. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. And Senator Voinovich wanted to 

add a comment. Please proceed. 

Senator VOINOVICH. I would just like to comment in terms of the 

issue of safety. We had a real problem at Davis-Besse in the State 

of Ohio. We had several hearings on that. There were lessons 

learned for the industry and there were lessons learned for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. And we have continued to followup 

on that to make sure that those lessons really were learned. 

I would also like to point out that the Nuclear Energy Institute, 

NEI, really is concerned about safety. Because they know if something happens that it is a reflection on the entire industry, particularly at a time when we are talking about more nuclear power facilities. And last but not least, the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, INPO, an industry organization itself, from what I understand, they put each of these management operations through the 

grinder to make sure they are doing the job that should be done. 

15 

So the public should know that we are spending a lot of time on 

oversight, and that some of these independent organizations really 

do care about safety and the reputation of the nuclear industry. 

Thank you. 

And I would like to introduce, if you wouldn’t mind, a paper that 

was published in Nuclear News, from the American Nuclear Society. It is one that I put together called Making the Nuclear Renaissance a Reality, which gets into all the various things we have to 

do if we expect to be successful when launching it. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. Without objection, it will be entered 

into the record. 

[The referenced information follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. We said our piece, and we will have some questions here in a few minutes. Chairman Klein, you are recognized 

for 5 minutes, each of your colleagues for 2 minutes. Try to stick 

roughly within those time constraints. 

So far, no votes have been ordered, so it looks like for this panel 

we have clear sailing. Chairman Klein, you are recognized, please 

proceed. Your entire statement will be made part of the record, as 

you know, and you are welcome to summarize. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF HON. DALE E. KLEIN, CHAIRMAN, NUCLEAR 

REGULATORY COMMISSION 

Mr. KLEIN. Good morning, Chairman Carper and Senator 

Voinovich and distinguished members of the Subcommittee. We 

thank you for inviting us here today to talk about the activities 

that we have underway on the new reactor licensing and the license renewal process. 

As indicated previously, I would certainly like to acknowledge 

Commissioner Svinicki as a new member of our Commission. We 

certainly welcome not only her technical expertise but also her 

knowledge of the Senate in terms of how it conducts its business 

will help our communication as well. 

I would like to thank you for your continuing support for the 

NRC’s activities. Because of your leadership and support, the NRC 

has successfully made the transition from preparing for new reactor technical reviews to actually doing them. At the same time, we 

remain focused on our top priority, and that is the safety and security of our existing licensees. 

Let me begin with a few words about the power uprates and license renewals. As of June 2008, the NRC has approved 119 power 

uprates which have added the generating capacity of about 5 new 

nuclear units. In addition, over half of the current fleet of operating 

reactors have received or are in the process of applying for license 

renewals. 

As you know, a plant’s initial 40-year license can be renewed for 

an additional 20 years if technical and safety requirements are 

met. An NRC Office of the Inspector General report issued last 

September examined the effectiveness of the NRC’s license renewal 

safety reviews. While it was generally positive, the OIG identified 

a number of areas for improvement, and we are responding to 

those suggestions. Let me assure you, the continued safety and security of all the operating reactors in the U.S. is of utmost concern 

to the NRC. 

Now let me turn to the case of the new reactors. The Congress 

has provided the NRC with the resources needed to successfully 

complete significant new reactor licensing activities. To date, we 

are on schedule. However, significant challenges remain. One involves the streamlined licensing process that was established under 

the so-called Part 52 rule. This assumes that applicants will be referencing NRC-certified designs in their applications and that the 

NRC will receive complete and high quality COL applications. 

To date, we have received 9 COL applications for 15 units. But 

only one of these five designs currently being referenced is a certified design, and it is only referenced in one COL application. This 

21 

is for the Advanced Boiling Water Reactor at the South Texas 

project. 

In addition, the design certification applications and some COL 

applications initially lacked information that the staff needs to 

complete its review, while others are modifying their applications. 

The result is that the early COL applications are unlikely to 

achieve the complete benefits that the Part 52 process had intended. 

We are of course working with our stakeholders to overcome 

these challenges, and we hope that the streamlining that was envisioned in Part 52 can be realized as we complete the initial COLs 

and we finalize the design certifications of these reactors. 

Based on the energy information that is submitted by the industry, we expect to receive 11 more applications for 16 more units by 

the end of 2009. But while there are challenges, I want to emphasize that the NRC is strategically positioned to be ready for these 

new reactor licensings and the associated workload. We created the 

Office of New Reactors, or NRO, to handle the agency’s activities. 

The office was aggressively staffed, and as Senator Voinovich indicated, we have hired a significant number of individuals. The New 

Reactor Office has over 425 individuals. 

With NRO in the lead, the NRC has taken great strides to prepare for the new reactor licensing challenges. In my written testimony, there is more detail given on these activities. 

Let me conclude by touching on two points. First, it has been 

suggested that there is not enough opportunity for public participation, both in the COL application and the license renewal process. 

We have provided you some handouts and we have provided charts 

that also show in fact, that there are significant opportunities for 

public participation, and we encourage that public participation. 

Not only does this occur at the COL stage, but it also occurs at the 

early site permit and the design certification stages, and it is also 

true in the entire license renewal process. 

Second, the GAO recently did an audit of the NRC’s readiness to 

conduct the reviews of the COL applications. It was generally positive. It acknowledges our existing preparation and the quality of 

our plans. As I noted in a letter to you, Senator Carper, on December 31st, the GAO identified four recommendations and we are addressing those concerns and issues as well. 

While we are satisfied that we have in place a stable, efficient 

regulatory process, the Commission is always looking for ways it 

can improve. As we have heard Senator Carper say a few times, 

if it isn’t perfect, make it better. 

I ask that my written testimony be entered into the record, and 

we look forward to the opportunity to have questions, keeping in 

mind that my general counsel is sitting behind me, and she reminds me that there are certain renewal activities that we will not 

be permitted to go into great detail, because the commissioners will 

be in an adjudicatory role. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Klein follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Mr. Chairman, thank you for that statement. 

I also want to thank you for using acronyms sparingly. In reading through the testimony, I don’t know about my colleagues, but 

I came across a couple of places where there were as many as four 

acronyms in one sentence. We had a Commerce Committee hearing 

last week, I had five acronyms in one sentence. I am not real good 

on those acronyms. You guys know what they are, I don’t always. 

So I would just ask that you continue to use those acronyms sparingly. Thank you. 

Commissioner Jaczko, has anyone ever mispronounced your 

name? 

Mr. JACZKO. I think not at this Committee. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. When we get to our last witness, I am going to 

ask Commissioner Svinicki to tell us exactly how she likes to pronounce her name, because I have heard it pronounced any number 

of ways. My staff was good enough to spell it out phonetically— 

wrong. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. So I am going to ask you to educate us all once 

and for all. 

Commissioner Jaczko, you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF HON. GREGORY B. JACZKO, COMMISSIONER, 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 

Mr. JACZKO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you and the other members of the Committee today to discuss the process for considering new reactor applications and the renewal of existing licenses for nuclear power 

plants. 

I agree with the Chairman that the safety and security of the operating reactors and the other materials licensees is the agency’s 

priority. Therefore, we appreciate that the Committee chose to include relicensing as well as the new reactor discussion at this hearing. 

Deciding whether to approve or disapprove an application is just 

the first step of a process that includes oversight of licensees to ensure compliance with safety requirements and it includes taking 

necessary enforcement actions when violations occur. Long standing problems, such as implementation of fire protection regulations 

and emergency core cooling systems sump screen issues at existing 

facilities must get resolved, both for the benefit of those existing 

plants and for the NRC to be able to exercise the most efficient 

oversight of any potential new plants. 

I do believe that applicants have more work to do to improve the 

timeliness, quality and completeness of new reactor applications if 

the NRC is going to be able to review them in an efficient, and 

most importantly, I think, predictable manner. I also agree with 

the Chairman that the NRC is well prepared today to deal with the 

work of license reviews and if applications are approved, regulating 

additional reactors. Thanks to the support of this Committee and 

the Congress, the NRC has been able to accomplish a tremendous 

amount of work to buildup its own internal infrastructure and it 

is well-positioned for the task ahead. 

87 

But I believe the NRC has more work to do. While we have done 

a great deal to get ready, there are three remaining areas that require the agency’s continued focus to ensure consistent oversight of 

any new reactors that may get built. We need updated regulations 

regarding security, aircraft impacts and waste confidence. I believe 

the staff has made progress in all three of these areas. And in fact, 

the Commission directed the staff to accelerate the development of 

the final security rule. The Commission has just received the rule 

package for consideration and has also made it publicly available. 

I intend to work quickly to vote on this issue and to do what I can 

to move it forward. 

As I mentioned at the hearing in February, the agency is still 

working on a final rule to require new nuclear power plants to be 

designed to withstand the impact of an aircraft crash. I remain 

hopeful that the final rule the staff provides to the Commission for 

approval this fall will ensure the requirements apply to any new 

plant built in this Country and that it includes clear criteria for 

how the NRC will determine compliance. Almost all of the entities 

that commented on the proposed rule supported changes in both of 

these areas. 

Finally, turning to the topic of license renewal improvements, the 

agency has a solid license renewal program in place. But I believe 

both the scope and the documentation of the process could be improved. First, because the scope of this program is so narrowly focused on the aging of components, members of the public will likely 

always raise substantive concerns about the license renewal process. I have proposed that the NRC include a review of emergency 

preparedness planning in relicensing, to reaffirm the safety finding 

initially made when the plant was licensed to operate. I believe 

that such a change would provide the NRC with the opportunity 

to potentially enhance safety and certainly to strengthen public 

confidence in the license renewal program. 

Second, I believe the agency should look back at a few completed 

license renewal safety evaluation reports these are the major documents that we use to make our safety findings to ensure the documentation issues raised by the Inspector General are easily resolved. This effort, when coupled with more thorough documentation of future relicensing proceedings, should effectively resolve 

what I believe is an important issue of public transparency in the 

license renewal process. 

Thank you for the opportunity to make these remarks, and I look 

forward to answering your questions. 

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Senator CARPER. Commissioner Jaczko, thank you very much. 

Commissioner Lyons. 

STATEMENT OF HON. PETER B. LYONS, COMMISSIONER, 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 

Mr. LYONS. Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, 

thank you very much for holding today’s hearing to discuss NRC’s 

licensing and relicensing processes for nuclear power plants. These 

are important issues. They are fundamental to earning the confidence of the American public in the safety of the Nation’s nuclear 

power plants. 

I support Chairman Klein’s testimony and I would like to elaborate further on just two specific points. Regarding the next generation nuclear plant, or NGNP, as I will refer to it, as the Chairman 

noted in his written remarks, we expect to deliver to Congress in 

August, jointly with the Department of Energy, our licensing strategy for the NGNP as required by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. 

This type of reactor offers specific potential safety enhancements 

over light water reactor technologies. It may serve to enable the 

use of nuclear power not only in electricity production with enhanced efficiency, but also as a source of process heat for many industrial applications. 

However, this advanced technology presents a set of licensing 

challenges, such as the safety performance of new types of fuel, to 

which the NRC must respond with new regulatory research. As we 

continue to implement this joint strategy with the DOE, the NRC 

will require resources that are appropriately matched with DOE 

funding on this project. 

In addition to our ongoing work on the NGNP, the NRC is receiving an increasing number of requests for pre-application meetings 

by potential applicants for small, so-called grid-appropriate advanced reactor concepts, for potential sales to developing nations 

and into markets with very small grids. There are currently no 

U.S. licensees expressing serious interest in building such plants. 

That has limited our associated resource allocations. 

In my own view, NRC engagement and research on the safety aspects of these particular reactor designs is in our national interest 

in helping to assure that safe reactor designs are used abroad, as 

well as encouraging non-proliferation. I also believe that resources 

for such research should not be derived from fees paid by our existing licensees. Therefore, my suggestion would be that NRC resources for activities such as these grid-appropriate reactors are a 

matter for which I believe congressional guidance is needed. And 

if this work is to be endorsed by Congress, then I think specific 

funding in that area will be important to the NRC. 

I thank the Subcommittee for the opportunity to address the topics today and I look forward to your questions. 

Senator CARPER. Dr. Lyons, thank you very much. 

Our first question for this panel will be to the last Commissioner, 

and the question is, how do you pronounce your name? 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. SVINICKI. Mr. Chairman, similar to many Americans who 

trace their ancestry to Ellis Island, the spelling you see on the card 

before me is not reflective of the pronunciation. There are what I 

93 

call some phantom vowels that are missing. There is not a unified 

opinion in my family, but Savenicki, so you would insert an A between the S and the V, and then the first I would become an E. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. SVINICKI. I think Commissioner Jaczko has some sympathy 

with his J. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. I have no further questions. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. You are recognized. Thanks so much, Commissioner Svinicki, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF HON. KRISTINE L. SVINICKI, COMMISSIONER, 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 

Ms. SVINICKI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Voinovich and 

members of the Subcommittee. 

I would begin by taking this opportunity to thank each of you 

and your fellow Senators for supporting my confirmation and thereby making possible, as has already been noted, my inaugural appearance before you today as a Commissioner. 

Senator Craig, I may be a bit nostalgic in this moment for the 

seat I used to occupy behind you, but I thank you for your kind 

words. 

When I appeared before the full Committee at my nomination 

hearing, I pledged to each of you that if confirmed, I would immerse myself in the issues and challenges facing the agency and 

that I would commit myself fully to contributing to what I view as 

the continued success of the Commission. In the approximately 3 

months since my swearing in, this has remained my commitment. 

Fresh from my experiences as Senate Committee staff, I was no 

stranger to long days, but since arriving at the Commission, I have 

never felt more keenly how few hours there are in any given day. 

Partly this is a result of my approach to addressing the ongoing 

work of the Commission, which is to research the last few years of 

Commission action and deliberation, and to try to set issues in a 

proper context before formulating my own view. I am assisted in 

this by an agency staff that I have found to be both highly skilled 

and highly eager to explain and debate its work. Their commitment 

to public service, as evidenced by their commitment to the work 

they do every day, has impressed me deeply. 

The NRC faces many challenges, already outlined by my colleagues, but none, in my view, are insurmountable. What success 

will require, however, is a sustained commitment to continual improvement in our processes and an eye always to safeguarding the 

trust that the public has resided in us. As I continue to develop my 

‘‘sea legs’’ at the Commission, these two areas will be my principal 

focus. 

Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t take this opportunity to 

thank publicly the three gentlemen who sit alongside me here. To 

a person, my fellow Commissioners and the Chairman have been 

unfailingly gracious and supportive in easing my transition, which 

has not always been an easy one, to the NRC. They have welcomed 

me fully to their ranks. They have been patient with my need to 

94 

research issues and come up to speed, and have extended every accommodation to me. I am grateful to each one of them. 

And Senator Isakson, just quickly, I support the Chairman’s testimony regarding the budgetary resources. Congress, as I am coming to discover, has been extremely supportive of the agency’s 

budget requests. But please know that I don’t take for granted that 

support is ours to lose. We have to re-earn it continually, so although we have had good support, we need to continue to earn 

your trust and confidence. 

I thank the Subcommittee for its support of the important work 

of the NRC and this opportunity to appear. I will endeavor to answer any questions you may have. 

Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Commissioner Svinicki, thank you very much 

for that statement. 

I live in Wilmington, Delaware, the northern part of our State. 

As we drive south on State Route 13 or State Route 1 down toward 

our beaches, you can see off to the east a couple of nuclear power 

plants. In fact, there are three of them that sit over there in Senator Lautenberg’s territory in New Jersey, Salem and Hope Creek. 

I have lived in Delaware since 1973 when I got out of the Navy and 

moved there. But those plants have had a checkered past in terms 

of their reliability, in terms of their ability to really be up and operate and provide electricity on an ongoing basis. 

I want to say roughly four or 5 years ago, Exelon was invited by 

PSEG to come in an operate the facilities. And the operating performance was improved dramatically. I cite them today because I 

think they are a glowing example of what has happened in the industry itself. We don’t have to go back all that many years for the 

ability to operate at full capability was probably in the 60, probably 

70 percent range. Today I think it is a lot closer to 90. 

So my first question for the panel, and I will just start with you, 

Chairman Klein, we know there are 104 nuclear power plants. We 

know that roughly half of them have applied for, initially approved 

for 40 years, roughly half have applied for and been approved, I 

think, for 20 years. How many of the 104 have actually been approved? How many are in process in terms of renewal license requests? 

Mr. KLEIN. We have approved 48, 17 are in process and we expect more to come. 

Senator CARPER. All right. I spent a lot of my life in naval aviation. I have flown in airplanes that were in some cases as old as 

the crew members that were flying them. We have still flying today 

P–3s, which I was a part of, we have C–130’s, which a lot of us 

have a lot of familiarity with, some B–52s that are still out there 

flying. I know there are concerns that we have from time to time 

about the safety and reliability of those aircraft. 

We have nuclear power plants that are 40 years old as well. As 

we consider renewing them and letting them fly, if you will, for another 20 years, or operate for another 20 years, it is not unexpected 

there would be some concerns raised about how safe can that be, 

just as, how safe can it be to fly a B–52 for 50 years or a P–3 for 

40 years and so forth. The question I have to start off with is, talk 

to us about those concerns that we have with allowing these plants, 

95 

they are large, complex and aging, to allow them to operate for another 20 years, at least. Why don’t you tackle that to start off with, 

Chairman Klein? 

Mr. KLEIN. Thank you, Senator Carper. 

Obviously the issue of the operating plants and their life extension is something we take very seriously. As these plants operate, 

conditions change. So we have a very robust review process to look 

at aging effects. That doesn’t mean for our employees, it means for 

the plants. 

Senator CARPER. Although some of your employees, like us, are 

aging, I am told. 

Mr. KLEIN. There are a few. 

So we have a very rigorous program. I think what is important 

to understand, and I think the IG referenced this in their report, 

and you will hear from them on the second panel, our technical details for which we look at during these license renewal reviews is 

very robust. Where we needed to make improvement, and we are 

making improvement, is on the documentation. In general, we 

spend over 10,000 hours to look at a license renewal application. 

So it is very rigorous, we look at it, we hear from the public and 

we try to communicate in an effective way. 

So public confidence, communication, explaining what we do, how 

we do it, is very important to us. 

Senator CARPER. Dr. Lyons, in following up, how long does this 

process usually take for renewals? Just answer that question in 

your comment you are going to give now. 

Mr. LYONS. The process is typically 22 months. We have had 

some shorter than that. It also depends on whether there may be 

hearings. But 22 months is our target, and that has generally been 

met. 

And may I comment briefly on what the Chairman just said? 

Senator CARPER. Sure. 

Mr. LYONS. To follow your analogy of planes that have been 

around for some time, those planes, at least I hope it is true, and 

you can tell me if it is, have also been the subject of continuing 

oversight, continuing maintenance and continuing, I hope, replacement of components as that became necessary. So in the same 

sense with nuclear power plants, they have been subject to that 

continuing oversight, continuing maintenance by the licensee, subject to our oversight, and many of the components have been replaced over that period of time. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

I have more questions, but I am going to yield to my colleagues 

for some questions. We will come back for a second round. Senator 

Voinovich. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman Klein, the NRC has had several months to review the 

first set of COL applications. Do you see anything that might jeopardize, and I would be interested in hearing from the other commissioners, that would jeopardize the agency’s goal of completing 

reviews within three and a half years, which seems to me to be a 

very long time. I don’t know what it takes, Senator Craig found 

out. How long does it take them to go through an application over 

in France? Did they get into that? 

96 

Senator CRAIG. No, we did not talk specific schedules. It depends, 

of course, on the design and the standardization. 

Senator VOINOVICH. The other thing is, it looks like we are going 

to have a continuing resolution that may not get done until February of next year. Does that have any impact on what you are trying to get done? 

Mr. KLEIN. Senator Voinovich, at this point, we see nothing that 

is insurmountable, as Commissioner Svinicki indicated in her testimony as well, that would prevent us from meeting our obligations. 

What we are learning as we work through these combined operating license applications is that we are getting better as an agency 

articulating what we want to see, and the applicants are getting 

better in their response. So we are seeing the quality of the applications and the completeness improve. So we are seeing the processes working. We are taking lessons learned as we articulate what 

we need and the applicants are doing better in terms of what they 

submit. So I think overall it is a positive story. 

Regarding the budget issue, a continuing resolution is challenging for us, because as you know, the Fiscal Year starts October 

1. I am now starting my third year at the NRC and we have never 

received a budget on time. It makes our planning difficult. And we 

will have some impacts, if the continuing resolution goes beyond 

February or March. We are planning for a continuing resolution. 

We can read the papers as well as you all can. So we are planning 

on a continuing resolution. We are trying to prepare for it. But if 

it extends beyond February or March, we will have some challenges 

in meeting our activities. 

What that will mean is that we will not compromise safety on 

that existing fleet. So what will suffer are the new things, which 

means license renewals, power uprates and the new reactors. We 

will have to prioritize. 

Senator VOINOVICH. One of the things, I had the impression that 

the designs were kind of cookie cutter, that they had been used in 

other places. I understand you have approved one design already. 

But then there are another two of them that are being used in 

other places in the world. Then you have two more designs that are 

brand new. Does that pose a real problem with you in terms of the 

timing? 

Mr. KLEIN. Senator Voinovich, it is a challenge. What we had expected as we went through the combined operating license aspects 

is that the design certifications for these various vendors would be 

complete. Obviously we have essentially completed the Advanced 

Boiling Water Reactor application and the Westinghouse AP1000 

design has been approved, but we are currently reviewing an 

amendment to that design. And we are reviewing the ESBWR, 

Areva, and Mitsubishi’s design. 

So what Senator Craig had observed in France is they have a 

much more standard process in their country than we have in our 

Country. We are free and open. Therefore, we will have more vendors providing reactors. I think what we will have to address as we 

go through the license review process, we will be doing things in 

parallel that we expected to do in series. But we will work with the 

utilities and the stakeholders to make sure we do it right. No liVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00100 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
97 

cense will be granted until we are confident that it will be safe and 

complete. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Any comments? 

Mr. JACZKO. Senator Voinovich, if I could add a few comments. 

I would perhaps, on the first question of if there are issues that I 

see jeopardizing the schedule, I would say that there are several, 

of the five designs that we are looking at. Three of them I would 

say right now would present challenges for us to complete a review 

in three and a half years, in the time period that we have talked 

about. With the AP1000 design, there are some outstanding issues 

that I referenced in my opening testimony about sump screen design. That is an issue that the staff is working on right now that 

may present some challenges. Until we have complete information, 

we can’t necessarily be sure when we will be able to complete that 

part of the review. So that may have an impact on our ability to 

get that design done. And that design is used by a number of the 

applicants that we are looking at in front of us. 

There are issues with one of the applicants that is referencing 

the AP1000, some issues again with incompleteness of information 

that may present challenges to us reviewing that application in a 

predictable manner. The application that the Chairman referenced 

related to the ABWR design, we have had some challenges with the 

vendor that is supporting that application. The applicant had to 

change the vendor, so that has caused a delay in our ability to review that application. 

The General Electric ESBWR design also came in with a modification recently to that design. The staff right now has not been 

able to publish a new schedule for when they would be able to complete the review of that design. So that may have impacts later on 

then on the applicants that are referencing that design. 

So those are all uncertainties that could create risks from the 

standpoint of the time it will take to review those designs. And just 

a specific comment on the continuing resolution, one of the issues 

that has come to my attention for new reactors in particular is how 

we treat new activity under a continuing resolution. Generally, the 

language prohibits the agency from engaging in any new activity. 

And it is unclear to me at this point, but there has been some discussion about how we treat new contracts that we might need to 

issue for new reactor application reviews. If that is considered to 

be a new activity, then under a continuing resolution, we wouldn’t 

be able to initiate some of those contracts. So that again may create some specific challenges with regard to reviewing some of the 

new reactors under a continuing resolution. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Senator Lautenberg. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you all for your testimony and the 

work that you do. The agency obviously has great responsibility, 

and particularly pronounced since the search for other sources to 

energize our Country are so much in demand. 

Dr. Jaczko, the NRC Inspector General’s 2007 report pointed out 

that the NRC didn’t even keep records of their reviews of license 

applications. Is that possible? And how important is that? 

Mr. JACZKO. I think, Senator, that is an issue we need to go back 

and review and audit, to make sure that we understand the imporVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00101 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
98 

tance of that information. But what the Inspector General found 

was that when our teams go out to audit the information that they 

have in the application to confirm the programs and the information was accurate, the notes and some of the information that they 

collected onsite they didn’t necessarily bring back with them to 

complete the review. So they would take the notes, they would 

have conversations with individuals there and then they would formulate their conclusions. And those conclusions would be reflected 

in their safety reports. 

So what I think we need to do is we need to go back and just 

verify, for the public ultimately, so that they are clear how we 

made those decisions and how we came to those conclusions. I 

think that will probably involve—— 

Senator LAUTENBERG. That is not very reassuring. 

Dr. Klein, is that detail critical in the evaluation? Is the IG correct in raising this as a point of some significant concern? 

Mr. KLEIN. I think again, as Commissioner Jaczko indicated, 

there is no evidence that the technical review was not done, the IG 

will discuss this issue on the second panel, and it is probably best 

for you to ask them that question. But what they pointed out is an 

area that we are addressing, what kind of notes and documents do 

we keep for record. It is no different than normal inspection activities, and everyone has to decide what they keep and what they discard. The IG pointed out that we should keep more complete 

records. It doesn’t imply that we didn’t do our job. But we are reexamining the kinds of records we keep. 

And as Commissioner Jaczko indicated, sometimes there is proprietary information that a company has. We look at that information but we don’t necessarily bring copies back. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. But the public is certainly entitled to be 

aware of the fact that these data are not being furnished as they 

should be. I am concerned about the fact that, well, it isn’t quite 

where it ought to be. How important is it that these review details 

be available? 

Mr. KLEIN. I think, again, what we looked at and what the IG 

looked at was, again, they found no weakness in our technical review. What we found was a weakness that we are correcting related to the documentation and the retention of the information. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. That is like the audit trail. It ought to be 

up to date. 

I was concerned before when the Chairman was going through 

a comparison of aging parts of the world, talking about B–52 and 

so forth. I was afraid he was going to get to Senators and say, all 

right, so there are replacement components that you can put in 

there, but nevertheless. It wasn’t very comfortable. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LAUTENBERG. During the Oyster Creek relicensing, the 

NRC did not initially insist on a sophisticated three-dimensional 

analysis of the structure of the dry well. How can the public have 

confidence in NRC’s relicensing process when it took prodding by 

a non-governmental agency and the company’s voluntary action to 

use the best technology available? 

99 

Mr. KLEIN. Unfortunately, the Oyster Creek issue is before the 

Commission. So the Commission can’t talk in a lot of details, because we will be in an adjudicatory role. 

So let me just talk in general about the confidence and the communication of how we do our license renewal. We do use technical 

input. We also expect and we appreciate independent input on 

things we can do better, and we continue to ask if there are things 

we can do better. 

Again, as I indicated earlier, when we go through the license renewal process, it is a very technical and very involved process taking over 10,000 hours. The public does have an opportunity to participate in that process. Unfortunately, I cannot talk specifically 

about Oyster Creek. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. I will close with this. The public is so skittish. Have you seen an accelerated rate of problems as these plants 

age? And why, if we had to look at the accident, the alarm rate 

that does come in the field, is it worthy of the concern that the 

public seems to exhibit? Or can we say that new technology, especially with the new plants, that new technology will make these 

plants absolutely safe, more efficient? Can we give any kind of an 

endorsement that would say to the public, OK, maybe we can bring 

the older ones up to snuff, but we have designs that now assure 

safety, no matter what? 

Mr. KLEIN. As Commissioner Lyons indicated, as plants age, a lot 

of the components are continuously replaced and modernized and 

upgraded. So when you go through a plant that has been in operation for a number of years, you will see a lot of new components, 

new upgrades, new technology, new techniques. 

I think from a public perspective, one of the advantages is, and 

the industry can talk more about this, the plants are running at 

a higher capacity factor and running a more reliable operation as 

people learn more about the operational aspects. What we typically 

see is high public confidence, and when we go out and hold hearings, in general around the nuclear plants, people are confident, 

their friends, neighbors and families work there, they go to church 

there, they go to school. So these are people in the communities 

that work in these plants. 

So in general, what we have seen is confidence in the community 

around the plants is pretty high. Because the communities are the 

ones that work and operate these plants. So we have not seen any 

negative trends. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Senator Inhofe. 

Senator INHOFE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

We are getting bogged down in so many details here. Those of 

us who are not as familiar with these processes we are looking at, 

if you could help us out a little bit. We are talking about two different things: the licensing of new applicants and then re-applications, licensing re-applications. Chairman Klein, in my opening 

statement I said that the hearing notice for the LES National Enrichment Facility included detailed schedule and policy guidance. 

Since that approach clearly instilled schedule and discipline in the 

process, I would first ask if the Commission is using that approach. 

I don’t think they are, so I would ask why not. 

100 

Mr. KLEIN. It turns out we did learn from LES, and we incorporated that in our processes. We modified a part of our regulatory 

structure called Part 2, which is not Part 52, but it is Part 2 of our 

regulatory framework, where we do have milestones and schedules 

outlined and available. So we knew in terms of this new reactor licensing wave that was coming forward to us, so we do have in our 

regulations in Part 2 milestones and objectives. So it is there, and 

we will provide that to you. 

Senator INHOFE. That is good. When you mentioned in your 

opening statement that the time, the hours required for a re-application were 10,000 hours, I believe you said, I asked my staff what 

it would be for a new application. They looked it up and said between 60,000 and 80,000 hours. Those of us, I think almost all of 

us up here in our opening statements said our concern is that we 

get there and get there quick. So we’re all concerned about streamlining, to the extent that we can do a better job and meet the best 

guidelines. 

Senator Isakson asked the question of one of you, I don’t remember which one, if we do have, if the resources that are there are 

going to be adequate. What I wouldn’t want to happen is to find 

out when we are having a hearing 6 months from now, well, we 

could have made these guidelines and these benchmarks, but we 

didn’t have the resources. So I would like to have each one of you 

responds as to, do you think right now with what you have, do you 

have adequate resources to try to meet these expectations of the 

Committee? 

Mr. KLEIN. Senator Inhofe, I believe on the resources issue we 

always try to be prudent and spend our funds wisely. But we, I believe, have hired, trained and held our staff accountable and laid 

out our clear expectations. At this point, on both license renewals 

and on new license reviews, we believe that we have the funds, assuming the budgets are passed, for 2009, that we will have the 

budgets that will meet those obligations. If we have to operate on 

a continuing resolution for the entire year for 2009, we will have 

difficulties. 

Senator INHOFE. That is a good point to bring out. Far be it from 

me, being a conservative, to try and push it even to a higher level 

in terms of the expenditures. But we do, we just want to make sure 

that you are not going to come back later and say you didn’t. That 

is a good thing to bring out on the CR. 

Mr. KLEIN. The other aspect I would like to point out on the efficiency is that we will, being a conservative regulatory body, we will 

be prudent and cautious as we go through these first phases of design certifications and the first COLs. What we expect to see, after 

we go through that, we definitely expect to have lessons learned 

and become more efficient with no compromises. 

Senator INHOFE. I don’t think anyone would disagree with that. 

Is that generally the feeling of the rest of the commissioners? 

All right, Commissioner—yes, Dr. Lyons. 

Mr. LYONS. If I may just add, I certainly agree with the Chairman on the adequacy of the resources as planned and potential 

concerns on the CR. However, I think we should also mention that 

if we talk about the Yucca Mountain application, we are quite concerned that we do not have adequate resources by a substantial 

101 

amount, depending on whether the House or the Senate versions 

might eventually be enacted. There may be a substantial shortfall. 

Senator INHOFE. All right, and Commissioner Jaczko, first of all, 

let me apologize to you. We had an appointment set up, and then 

all of a sudden, I had to be on the floor. So you met with my staff 

instead of with me, and I regret that. As I recall, during your confirmation hearing, I was the one who initiated the idea that we 

need to be talking. So we will make sure we get back on that track. 

Mr. JACZKO. I appreciate that. 

Senator INHOFE. The National Academy of Sciences report issued 

last November recommends shortening the review time for licensing applications to 3 years. As I understand in your opening remarks, you said that the time that you folks have is a little bit 

longer than that, it is some 42 months plus Commission action, 

which would be three and a half to 4 years. You were reluctant to 

think you could even keep that schedule, let alone 3 years. Is this 

your position? 

Mr. JACZKO. I believe right now there is potential for challenges 

with that. I think we haven’t necessarily seen the completeness 

and the quality on the applications that we are looking for. If you 

look at some of the schedules that the staff has published, there 

are important milestones that they have laid out when they need 

to see information from applicants. And there have been challenges 

with applicants meeting some of those milestones. As a result, 

some of those schedules may not be met. I think that is part of this 

process. 

I think as the Chairman has indicated several times, the new reactor licensing process was generally envisioned to have a complete 

design that an applicant would literally almost pull off the shelf, 

they would have an environmental review that was completed that 

they would pull off the shelf, and then they would marry those two 

together in a license application. In doing that, you would have a 

very efficient and a very orderly way to get to the resolution on the 

remaining issues. 

Right now we are trying to do all those things at once, which is 

allowable under our processes, certainly. But it is a little bit more 

unpredictable and it has a lot more moving parts that can depend 

on one piece crucially. And if some of those other pieces are delayed, then we will have challenges. 

Senator INHOFE. Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. But for the 

record, I would like to get a response from the other three, not now 

but for the record, as to the recommendation on that 3-year time 

period. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. And if you would all respond for the record, 

that would be much, much appreciated. Thank you. 

[The referenced information was not received at time of print.] 

Chairman KLEIN: Our current combined operating license (COL) 

application reviews will exceed the 3-year timeframe recommended 

by the National Academy of Sciences. I believe our initial reference 

plant COL reviews will take closer to 4 years due to the first time 

use of our Part 52 combined licensing process, ongoing design certification reviews, and needs for additional information. As the 

NRC completes its reviews of the reference plant COLs, the process 

102 

should become more efficient and move closer to the suggested 3 

year timeline. We will continue to improve our process and use lessons learned to become more efficient without compromising our 

core values. 

Commissioner LYONS: I appreciate the thought and analysis that 

the Academy gave to this subject. The NRC will continue to do our 

best to be an efficient as well as effective regulator. We have not 

yet issued a construction and operating license pursuant to 10 CFR 

Part 52, which is the focus of the Academy’s recommendation. 

Therefore, currently we are in somewhat of a ‘learn as we go’ mode. 

The original estimates for our review schedule were based on our 

historical experience with 10 CFR Part 50 licensing, and we needed 

those estimates as inputs to our planning, hiring, and budgeting 

processes. However, there are a great many factors that will influence the actual schedules, not the least of which is the quality and 

completeness of the submitted applications. We will most certainly 

continue to improve our efficiency and effectiveness as we go 

through this process to the actual issuance of a Part 52 license. 

Commissioner SVINICKI: As was experienced in the agency’s license renewal reviews, over time, efficiencies can be gained 

through the resolution of generic issues and increased knowledge 

of the processes. Consequently, I expect that as applicants and the 

NRC staff become more familiar with the issues and challenges 

both technical and procedural related to reviewing new reactor applications, the agency will be better able to maximize efficiencies 

leading to shortened review times, while ensuring a stable and predictable process. 

Senator CARPER. Senator Sanders, and we have been joined by 

Senator Cardin. Welcome. 

Senator SANDERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have about five 

questions I would beg brief responses, if I could. Let me begin, 

Chairman Klein, with a request. The State legislature and the Governor have formed an independent panel in Vermont to try to understand how the State relates to Vermont Yankee. There is going 

to be a meeting tomorrow in Montpelier. There has been a request, 

as I understand it, from the NRC, to get a representative there to 

help this panel deal with very complicated issues. Can I have your 

commitment that you will send a representative to Montpelier tomorrow? 

Mr. KLEIN. I certainly would expect, if the State would like us 

to be there, we will have a representative. 

Senator SANDERS. I believe that is the case. Do you think, then, 

we can have a representative there? 

Mr. KLEIN. Yes. 

Senator SANDERS. Thank you very much. 

Let me ask Dr. Jaczko, as I mentioned earlier, this took place 

last year. And this was on the front pages of every paper in 

Vermont, great concern, I get many, many e-mails on this issue. 

What was the fine that Entergy paid for this mishap? How many 

millions of dollars was that? 

Mr. JACZKO. This did not fall under the part of our enforcement 

where we issued a fine. So there was no fine, I believe. 

Senator SANDERS. There was no fine at all. Do you think that the 

American people would be a little bit surprised and concerned that 

103 

the management of a major nuclear power plant paid no fine for 

this mishap? Do you think they would say, gee, we think there is 

something a little bit strange there? 

Mr. JACZKO. I think generally the public views issuing fines as 

synonymous with enforcement action. The staff, when they did review this, found that the licensee had not complied with some of 

our regulations in regard to keeping up with information in the industry about the ability of this kind of problem to fail. The enforcement action we then took was part of a process where we don’t 

issue fines. And I think—— 

Senator SANDERS. Well, I would say, on behalf of many millions 

of people, I think they would be very surprised that a mishap of 

this scope ends up with no fine at all on the part of the managing 

company. Which raises a question also about whether the NRC in 

fact should be actively inspecting all aspects of a nuclear power 

plant, rather than just the core safety issues. That is another issue 

I would like to get into in the future. 

Let me just raise another issue. I was glad Dr. Lyons mentioned 

a magic word that I don’t believe had been mentioned earlier, it is 

called Yucca Mountain. Right now, we have a number of plants, including Vermont Yankee, which have very lethal radioactive waste 

which is now being deposited locally. That was never the intention. 

Now, my friends may disagree with me or know more about this 

than I do, but I have every reason to believe, or at least strong reason to believe that Yucca Mountain as a repository for nuclear 

waste will never going to happen. We have spent billions of dollars 

on it, it will never going to happen. There are people here talking 

about the construction of dozens of more nuclear power plants. We 

don’t have a place to deposit the waste. Somebody please tell me 

what sense that makes to the American people. Dr. Lyons? 

Mr. LYONS. From the standpoint of the safe storage of spent fuel 

onsite, I have high confidence in dry cask storage, as does the 

agency. 

However, I think your question is, ‘‘Is that appropriate national 

policy?’’ That is not something that the NRC should be deciding. In 

other words, I don’t think the NRC should be deciding whether 

storage, albeit safe, at plants is appropriate. 

Senator SANDERS. But you may have high confidence in it, and 

it is a technical issue which I am not prepared to argue. But clearly, that was not the original intention. The original intention was 

not to have dozens of locations around this Country where we are 

storing very lethal waste with a half-life of thousands of years. 

Mr. KLEIN. Let me just comment. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission just received the application for Yucca Mountain, and we 

will go through a technical review. 

Senator SANDERS. It will go through a technical review. But I 

happen to know both Senators from Nevada who are not terribly 

sympathetic about that application. 

Let me ask my last question. We have heard, staff told me that 

at a meeting with the NRC it is projected that the cost of a new 

nuclear power plant could be as high as $20 billion, cost of going 

up. Have there been independent studies to figure out what the 

value in terms of energy savings or energy production would be, 

using that $20 billion for energy efficiency or sustainable energy? 

104 

In other words, $20 billion is a hell of a lot of money for a nuclear 

power plant. How does that compare to investing in energy efficiency? 

Mr. KLEIN. This is not an area that as the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission we would get into. We typically do not put a lot of 

value on economics and where people should invest money. Our 

charge is safety, security, protecting people and the environment. 

So that is not our area. While we may have opinions personally, 

it is not something that the NRC does. 

Senator SANDERS. Am I correct in understanding that a new nu- clear power plant could cost as much as $20 billion? Is that within 

the ball park? 

Mr. KLEIN. I have not heard numbers that high. 

Senator SANDERS. Anyone else want to comment on that? Dr. 

Jaczko. 

Mr. JACZKO. Generally there would be estimates, I would say, of anywhere from $6 billion to $10 billion right now, depending on the 

size, for a single unit. So a site that might have two units could 

get into that. 

Senator SANDERS. Six to ten for a single unit is what we are 

hearing? 

Mr. JACZKO. Yes. 

Senator SANDERS. Dr. Lyons. 

Mr. LYONS. Again, I would agree with the Chairman, that is simply not our business. Our focus has to be on the safety, not on the 

cost. 

Senator SANDERS. Fair enough. But it is our business, $20 billion or $10 billion is a heck of a lot of money. We have to make sure 

that we are investing it in the best way in terms of energy in 

America, whether it is efficiency or producing new types of energy. 

That is my only point. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. That is a good question to ask, and it is one you 

may want to consider offering to our next panel. 

I think Senator Craig is next, if I am not mistaken, then to Senator Cardin and Senator Isakson. 

Senator CRAIG. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, and to all 

of you again, thank you for your responses to the different Senators. I will try not to travel the same track, so Dr. Lyons, I will 

go directly to you and comments you made about NGNP and the 

ability to handle that licensing process in a responsible way. 

As you know, we are now looking at the possibility of creating 

an Advanced Reactor Office, legislating that. We are working inside 

the Energy Committee now to look at that reality. The President’s 

budget has about $4 million in it that deals with new advanced design high temperature gas reactors. If you visit with me and all of 

you commissioners certainly could respond, I think I share your 

concern about doing it right, obviously, and doing it in a timely 

fashion. It has a broader scope than just licensing for application 

in this Country. I have spent a good number of years looking at it, 

in fact, legislated it in part into being because of its flexibility, its 

safety, what it can do beyond light water. Modularizing it, shaping 

it to different loads, being able to possibly produce hydrogen, being 

able to produce processed heat at reasonable cost from smaller 

105 

units to chemical facilities and all of that kind of thing in a futuristic approach. 

Is it reasonable to assume that you can get your work done with 

the talent that has been historically focused on light water? Do we 

need to create an Advanced Reactor office within the NRC that 

brings that kind of talent and focus to the new concepts? While I 

am not suggesting that those who look at current light water designs are not flexible, I am saying, I think I am trying to gather 

from your comments that we need to look at it in a different way. 

Make your comments in relation to what I have just said, if you 

would, please. 

Mr. LYONS. Senator Craig, I think speaking for myself, at least, 

I think the Commission would certainly look to guidance from Congress if it wishes to create an Advanced Reactor office. I personally 

don’t think that is essential. I believe that within the existing New 

Reactor Office there already has been considerable thought given 

to how we would move forward with licensing of the NGNP. And 

as I mentioned, I believe it is in the Chairman’s written statement, 

that we will provide a joint strategy with DOE as demanded by the 

Energy Policy Act of 2005, a joint strategy to work toward the licensing and the research that is required. That would be accomplished whether or not we had a separate Advanced Reactor office. 

I personally don’t feel strongly that is necessary. 

Senator CRAIG. OK. Yes, Kristine. 

Ms. SVINICKI. Senator Craig, I would support the answer that 

Commissioner Lyons gave, in that I don’t know that a new organization within the NRC would cure the challenges related to this. 

I think what Commissioner Lyons was expressing in his opening 

statement, and he can modify this if it is not correct, is that just 

as we are discussing today an agency that wants to posture itself 

and lean forward into new reactors, whether that be NGNP or commercial applications, what does that take? It takes a lot of preparatory activities. For a technology such as NGNP that the agency 

will not have licensed before, is not likely to have licensed before, 

we need to be able to have the resources to do that. 

Now, Congress did foresee NRC’s role in legislating the NGNP 

project. All appropriations, I would note, go to the Secretary of Energy. So the NRC receives its resources as a flow-through. So Congress was forward-looking on that, but we need to maintain a cognizance that we are receiving our resources in order to do that at 

the discretion of DOE. 

Senator CRAIG. OK. Further comments on this discussion? 

Mr. KLEIN. I think the comments that Commissioners Lyons and 

Svinicki both made are really appropriate. What we need to do is 

work parallel with the Department of Energy to establish a regulatory framework, as these new technologies come forward. We 

have this minor problem called budgets since we capture about 90 

percent of our budget through fees to licensees. So for us, we believe that we should start in parallel, so as the Department of Energy is coming up with new technologies, we need to be working 

with them, not wait until they have an answer, so that we can do 

the preparation of our staff, determine the regulatory requirements 

in process. 

106 

But for us, it will come back to budgets, so that we can hire and 

train those individuals for which we don’t have the fee recovery. 

Senator CRAIG. A followup briefly to that, then, because my time 

is up. So what we are hearing from you, instead of taking resources 

from the fees collected, appropriated dollars going to you, so that 

you can parallel and cooperate and work as you wish, as you need 

to with DOE in that relationship? Is that what I am hearing? 

Mr. KLEIN. That is absolutely what I think the three of us have 

stated. We do need basically the consistent funding, so we can hire, 

train and get these individuals, so we can look at these long-term 

projects in parallel with the Department of Energy. 

Senator CRAIG. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. You bet. 

Senator Cardin, welcome, we are glad to see you. 

Senator CARDIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would ask unanimous consent that my opening statement could be included in the 

Committee record. 

Senator CARPER. Without objection, so ordered. 

Senator CARDIN. Let me thank you very much for holding this 

hearing. I think it is very important. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s work is extremely important to our Country. I have had 

an opportunity to see first-hand the work that is done. I thank all 

of you for your commitment to safety and to the community issues. 

Dr. Klein, I want to concentrate on one part of your statement 

that has me concerned in response to Senator Inhofe’s questions on 

resources. You State that early COL applications are unlikely to 

achieve the full benefits of the Part 52 process. If I understand the 

Part 52 process, it is to have an effective, timely and predictable 

process. And I want to make sure there is nothing more you need 

from Congress in order to achieve the full benefits of a process that 

will give the highest level of assurance to the public of safety and 

move the system as effectively and efficiently and as timely as possible to achieve the results. 

So let me just ask an open-ended question. Is there anything 

more that we should be doing in order to make sure that the full 

benefits of the Part 52 process can be achieved? 

Mr. KLEIN. The short answer is yes. And it has to do with space. 

We now have hired, as Senators Carper and Voinovich know, we 

have hired new people to meet this new workload. One of the challenges that we have now is that we have had to move into four 

rental locations. And that has a lot of inefficiencies in it. We have 

to duplicate security, we have to duplicate computer systems, we 

have to have a shuttle bus, lost time on all those activities. So I 

would say that there is one aspect that you could help us on, and 

that is consolidation of our space, so that we can all be back together. 

The Kemmeny Commission made a comment after Three Mile Island, that one of the complicating factors was the fact that the 

NRC was located in seven different locations. We are going right 

back to that, because we can’t seem to get consolidated. So space 

would help us. 

Senator CARDIN. I am very familiar with that issue. Dr. Lyons. 

Mr. LYONS. Senator Cardin, I certainly agree with the Chairman’s comment. But I would add one more. We have provided recVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00110 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
107 

ommended legislation to the Committee on the area of mandatory 

hearings. Right now, I would say there is a highly antiquated provision in the Atomic Energy Act that requires us to hold a so-called 

mandatory hearing in the COL process even though there is nothing contested. We have suggested that has been overtaken by many 

events, everything from sunshine laws to freedom of information to 

the FACA Committee and commission requirements that have been 

levied. 

The idea of having a mandatory hearing when there is nothing 

contested is an unnecessary inefficiency. 

Senator CARDIN. Is there agreement on that? 

Mr. JACZKO. Senator, I respect Commissioner Lyons’ views on 

that, but I don’t agree that the mandatory hearing would play little 

if any role. There is the potential that with these new reactor proceedings, there may not be a contested issue. As a result, if we 

eliminate the mandatory hearing provision, there would be no formal hearing at all on the licensing process. 

I think sometimes we place too much of a burden on the public 

to generate issues. It is not the responsibility, necessarily, of intervenors to come up with every possible issue. And if they happen 

to not have tremendous resources, they may focus on one or two 

issues. Those may not turn out to be the issues of most significance 

in a hearing process. 

So simply relying on the issues that are brought by intervenors 

I think is not necessarily the measure of whether or not a hearing 

should happen. 

Senator CARDIN. Let me just make sure I have it straight, here. 

As far as the space efficiency issue, is there any disagreement that 

space efficiency is an issue that is affecting the compliance with the 

new procedures? Everybody agrees with that. 

On the hearing issue, I hear there is disagreement. Are there 

any other matters that you want Congress to do to make it more 

likely that the benefit of this process can be achieved? 

Mr. KLEIN. It would help to have timely budgets. 

Senator CARDIN. That is beyond any of our—now you have gone 

too far. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARDIN. Let’s get realistic here. 

Mr. JACZKO. Senator, if I could add one other point, too. One 

issue that I think might be helpful is a reexamination of some of 

the deadlines that were put into the Energy Policy Act. For several 

of the incentives and the benefits, there are milestones and deadlines. In my view, some of those milestones and deadlines have certainly, I think, achieved their goal, which is to stimulate and generate interest in the industry to submit applications and to submit 

filings. But one of the downsides of that has been a rush of applications and a rush of filings to meet those milestones. And revisiting 

some of those milestones may in fact I think actually enhance the 

process, because it will provide more breathing room for applicants 

to come to us when their applications are really complete and really ready, and allow us to work through a number of applications 

in a more focused or smaller number in a more focused way to get 

those done in a timely and predictable manner, and demonstrate 

how the process can work. 

108 

When I first came to the Commission in 2005, there was talk of 

two applications. And now we are talking about, over the next several years, 20 some applications for 30 units. A lot of that is driven, 

the timing is driven by some of those milestones in the Energy Policy Act incentive. 

So revisiting those I think could help to alleviate some of that 

initial crunch. 

Senator CARDIN. Mr. Chairman, could I ask that you review the 

two points that have been raised here about perhaps unnecessary 

hearings and also the limits, times that are in the law? And if 

there is a consensus recommendation that would help streamline 

the process, I think we would welcome receiving that information. 

Mr. KLEIN. We will send you something in writing. 

Senator CARDIN. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator CARPER. Yes, if you will make that available to the full 

Committee and Subcommittee, that would be terrific. 

[The referenced information was not received at time of print.] 

Senator CARPER. All right, Senator Isakson. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, Senator Carper. 

I am sorry the picture is gone, but Dr. Jaczko, you seem to be 

familiar with that incident. 

Mr. JACZKO. I think we all are, Senator. 

Senator ISAKSON. OK. Nobody has told, I don’t know what that 

incident was? What was I looking at? What actually happened? 

Mr. JACZKO. That was a bank of cooling towers which are used 

at the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station to help reduce the 

temperature in the water, so that it can be discharged to a local 

river, I believe, in order to meet environmental constraints on the 

operation of the plant. 

Senator ISAKSON. Was that either a safety or an environmental 

threat? 

Mr. JACZKO. Certainly it poses the potential for the licensee to 

exceed their permitting requirements on the environmental side. 

Senator ISAKSON. For discharge? 

Mr. JACZKO. For discharge, exactly. Now, they reduced power as 

a result of that, so that they would stay within their limits. So as 

a result, they actually had to go down in power to maintain their 

allowable levels of discharge. 

Mr. KLEIN. There is one cell that is safety-related, but only one 

cell. The affected unit was not a safety cell. And I think one of the 

difficulties we have had explaining this is obviously that is a very 

graphic picture. But for us, it is not a safety-related issue. As Commissioner Jaczko indicated, the company had the power down so 

they did not exceed their temperature limits. But it was not a safety issue for the reactor. 

Senator ISAKSON. For the record, I just thought the record ought 

to reflect, I thought I heard you saying it in your answer, Mr. 

Jaczko, this was not a safety or environmental violation, which is 

why it didn’t rise to the level of a fine. 

Mr. JACZKO. Certainly I wouldn’t say that it wasn’t, well, in the 

end, though, the licensee didn’t violate their environmental provisions, because they did reduce power. But that is a required system 

to meet environmental protection issues. 

109 

Senator ISAKSON. I understand. I think that needs to be in the 

record. 

Not to pick on you, Dr. Jaczko, but you made a comment about 

activity. I understand Dr. Klein’s statement about a CR and the 

budgetary constraints that you have. But I heard you say there 

may be, you used the word may, a statutory prohibition for a new 

activity under a CR. And I read this graph here that my staff has 

provided me with, where you have 13 pending applications and are 

anticipating 9 or 10 or 11 more. Those 9 or 10 or 11, then, if they 

came in during a CR, are you saying that would be a new activity, 

therefore you would be statutorily prohibited from beginning the 

process? 

Mr. JACZKO. That is a question that I have had discussions with 

the staff about. I don’t have yet a complete answer, but I think it 

is one that—I don’t think, in my view, that is the intention of what 

a new activity would be defined as. It may be just a requirement 

that we have to adhere to. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you. I would just suggest to the Chairman, that seems like a technicality we need to correct. Because I 

understand the CR problem, but I don’t understand an application 

actually being prohibited just because you are under a CR. 

Dr. Klein, did you say 90 percent of your budget comes in terms 

of fees from the industry you regulate? 

Mr. KLEIN. Yes. In the late 1990’s, it was changed from 100 percent fee recovered to 90 percent fee recovered. So all of our licensees pay for our services. 

Senator ISAKSON. I think that is important for us to note in this 

whole CR question, too, of course, it ultimately always is taxpayers’ 

money, whether the utility is paying it, they got it from the taxpayer, or the taxpayer does. 

Mr. KLEIN. A lot of these are ratepayer dollars, as opposed to 

taxpayer dollars. 

Senator ISAKSON. Well, ratepayers are generally, not always, 

but—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ISAKSON [continuing].—generally are taxpayers. 

Dr. Lyons, you responded on Yucca Mountain, or were in part of 

that discussion. I will close with this, Mr. Chairman. I understand 

the controversy at Nevada. I understand the controversy anywhere 

when you are talking about storing nuclear waste. 

But as I understand it, the French process of recycling reduces 

spent nuclear fuel from nuclear reactors by 90 percent. Is that a 

proper understanding? 

Mr. KLEIN. That is a general rule of thumb. It may not always 

be 90, but it is significant. 

Senator ISAKSON. I think it is important to understand. The 

members from South Carolina and Georgia have gone to Secretary 

Bodman extensively over the last few years, as the Savannah River 

site has ratcheted down in terms of its workload. There is a site 

that has built the nuclear warheads for our arsenal for I guess 40 

or 50 years, has been environmentally totally safe the entire time. 

In fact, the university system of Georgia has an environmental laboratory that has monitored for decades. 

110 

It would seem like although you regulate and don’t advocate, it 

would seem like a MOX facility to reprocess spent fuel and reduce 

the waste by 90 percent would be something we ought to be investigating as a Nation. I would appreciate, Dr. Lyons, your comment 

on that. 

Mr. LYONS. Speaking from the NRC’s perspective, our focus has 

to be on the safety of whatever is proposed. Speaking as an individual, I do believe that reprocessing is a better approach for the 

Nation in terms of a spent fuel management overall strategy. 

Senator ISAKSON. Do any of the commissioners disagree with that 

statement? 

[Negative responses.] 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. 

Senator CARPER. And thanks for asking that question. 

One more round, and then we will excuse this panel. 

The NRC does not require a public hearing, and I think this, we 

actually started getting into this with one of Senator Cardin’s questions. So I am going to followup to that. The NRC does not require 

a public hearing for plant renewal unless a contention is filed and 

admitted by the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board. If you 

feel it is important to have a mandatory public hearing for new 

plant licenses, why not for license renewals? You talked a little bit 

about this, but I want to get back to it. 

Mr. KLEIN. Speaking personally, I am not really excited about 

mandatory hearings if there are no issues that have been brought 

forward. By the time a hearing or an issue has come up, we have 

so much dialog with the public, with the opportunity for intervention, that if there are no new issues to be addressed, I am not a 

supporter of mandatory hearings. 

Senator CARPER. Anybody else, briefly? 

Mr. LYONS. I think I already indicated my statement against the 

mandatory hearing. 

Senator CARPER. Anyone else? Commissioner Svinicki. 

Ms. SVINICKI. Yes, thank you. I didn’t respond earlier. I am supportive of the Commission’s legislative proposal to eliminate the 

mandatory hearing. 

Senator CARPER. All right. Commissioner Jaczko. 

Mr. JACZKO. Just to complete the set, I actually am not supportive of that provision, for the reasons I indicated. The mandatory hearing, or the hearing process, plays an important role. As 

I said, I think we may over-emphasize the distinction between contested and non-contested. Contested simply means that intervenors 

have come forward with specific issues. But I certainly would not 

want to say today that we are dependent upon intervenors to identify what the problems are with any application. The hearing 

serves as an opportunity for the Commission itself to formally review the application, to formally review the decisions that the staff 

has made. It provides licensing boards an opportunity to review the 

decisions and determinations of the staff. 

So it serves an important oversight and management function on 

the part of the Commission, whether there are contested issues or 

not. So I think eliminating that mandatory hearing provision is 

tantamount to eliminating the hearing provision. I don’t know that 

I am comfortable with that at this point. 

111 

Senator CARPER. So out of the four commissioners, three of you 

believe that if there is not a contentious issue that is being raised, 

at least for the license renewals, that a public hearing is not appropriate. But I believe you all feel that whether there is a contentious 

issue or not, on a new application, there has to be a hearing or series of hearings, is that correct? 

Mr. KLEIN. We have a lot of public dialog, a lot of public comments. We expect early on that we will have contested issues and 

we will have hearings. 

Mr. LYONS. And I do not support mandatory hearings for new 

plants. I concur with the Chairman that there are many, many opportunities for public input, public involvement, and, as I stated 

earlier, there are a number of pieces of legislation which I believe 

have provided many more opportunities for public input and public 

knowledge, which in my mind no longer require the mandatory 

hearing for the new plant. 

Senator CARPER. Very briefly, please. 

Mr. JACZKO. If I could just very briefly refer to one comment the 

Chairman made. With regard to the safety review that the Commission conducts, there is no opportunity for public hearing. We 

have opportunities for public hearing on the environmental provisions. The only opportunity for public participation on the safety 

review is through the hearing process. 

Senator CARPER. All right, thank you. 

For the renewal license hearings, public groups claim that the 

NRC provides legal support for the industry. Is that true? I’ll State 

it again. For the renewable license hearing, some public groups 

claim the NRC provides legal support for the industry. Is that a 

true assertion? 

Mr. KLEIN. I don’t believe we provide legal support for the industry. We provide legal support for ourselves. But the industry should 

pay their own bills. 

Senator CARPER. There is a member of your staff right over your 

right shoulder who is nodding her head no. Is that your legal counsel? 

Senator CARPER. That is our General Counsel. 

Senator CARPER. All right, fair enough. Does anyone else want 

to respond to that assertion? 

Mr. JACZKO. That may be in reference to some of the confusion 

about how our hearing process works. Because we generally have 

three parties involved, usually the applicant, the staff and then individuals who raise concerns. And often, by the time we actually 

get into many of the arguments and the discussions in the hearing 

process, the staff has done a lot of their review of the application. 

So the staff positions are often consistent with the positions of the 

applicant. So sometimes intervenors get the impression that there 

is a level of working together there that isn’t necessarily always 

the case. But it does pose a challenge, I think, from a perception 

issue and from a communication issue. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. One more on waste confidence. Senator Voinovich had written to the Chairman of the NRC on the 

waste confidence rule. But waste confidence is crucial for the 

health for the health of this industry. Where is the Commission in 

112 

the waste confidence rule process, and when do you think it will 

be finalized? 

Mr. KLEIN. We received some information from our trusty Office 

of General Counsel, behind me, from the staff on recommendations 

and ways forward. We hope to have a decision on that soon. It is 

very likely that it will be within the next 2 weeks or less. And we 

will likely address it through a rulemaking process. We have a few 

technicalities to address. 

I think the important part is to note that dry cast storage is safe. 

We have a lot of confidence in that. I do believe that as we move 

forward, it is very important that there is an agreement between 

the Department of Energy and the utilities for these new plants, 

so that it will give us as a Commission more confidence that there 

is a final path forward for those new plants. 

Senator CARPER. Does anyone else want to comment? No. OK. 

Senator Voinovich. 

Senator VOINOVICH. I would just like to point out a couple of 

things and then ask a question. When the EPA did the analysis of 

the Lieberman-Warner-Boxer bill, they claimed that in order for 

them to meet the caps that they specify in the application that 

there would have to be 150 new plants built by 2050. When the Energy Information Agency looked at the same thing, they came back 

and said, 65 plants by 2030. We have heard a lot today about the 

timing it will take in order to move these along. But from a practical point of view, first of all, what are the chances of getting 65 

new facilities by 2030, No. 1 and No. 2, even if these applications 

move through the process, when do you predict that they would 

come online, which is another issue that people are concerned 

about? 

And the third question really is one that we have been working 

on for a long time, and that is the issue of security. As we have 

had these hearings, I have urged the Commission to get more into 

actually safety, the safety culture, the regimen, the standards that 

are being implemented at the various reactors, and where have you 

gone in terms of improving upon that aspect of this? Because prior 

to this, it seemed that they let the issue of safety culture within 

the framework of the people that were operating these facilities, 

and there wasn’t any kind of standards that you applied to determine whether or not safety, in effect, was something that was 

being done at these facilities. 

Mr. KLEIN. I will take those in order. 

I believe, whether we could have 65 plants online by 2030 is 

more of an infrastructure issue, rather than a regulatory issue. As 

I have said before, I don’t believe the NRC will be a bottleneck in 

this process. We intend to be responsive with our obligation of safety and security, but also meeting appropriate milestones. So I think 

the number of plants that could be available by any given date will 

probably hinge more on manufacturing, construction and other talents, not the regulator. 

In terms of reactors coming online, it is reasonable to believe 

that if applications come in on time, and we are able to receive requests for additional information, I believe it is reasonable to assume that new plants should be running in the 2016 to 2017 timeframe. And again, the number of those that are in operation probVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00116 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
113 

ably depends upon the contracts that the utilities will be able to 

enable them to actually build. Again, I don’t believe they will be 

limited by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

And then to your final question on safety culture. Safety culture 

is extremely important, as Davis-Besse pointed out. We have two 

pilots underway with utilities to look at how do you measure, how 

do you encourage safety culture internally. We are also looking at 

a safety culture internal. In other words, we should hold ourselves 

as accountable as those we regulate, so we are looking at a safety 

culture within the NRC. 

The challenge with the safety culture is, how do you measure it? 

What are your metrics? So you often end up measuring surrogates 

in terms of, do people have the ability to raise issues without retribution? Is there an open communication channel? Things of that 

nature. So a safety culture is something that we are focused on. We 

have pilots. But we haven’t, as an industry, and we don’t know of 

any industry that really has a good metric on how do you measure 

safety culture. But we are trying to find it. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. And I would urge you to continue 

that search. My hope is that you will find it and put it to good use. 

We appreciate very much your being here today and thank you 

for your testimony. Thank you for your response to our questions. 

Thank you for the leadership that you provide for our Commission. 

I want to say before you leave, what you are doing is just enormously important to our Nation. We face this huge and growing reliance on foreign energy. A lot of it is controlled by people who 

don’t like us very much. I am convinced they are using our money 

to hurt us. And we have grave threats to our environment, really 

to our world by virtue of global warming, and enormous threats to 

our health, especially for us who live on the east coast, because we 

are at the end of the tailpipe when it comes to sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and mercury. And nuclear energy is certainly not the sole 

answer, there is no silver bullet here. My colleagues have referred 

to any number of other things that we need to do, including renewable energy, efficiencies and conservation. There are plenty of other 

things we can and need to do all at once. But what you are doing 

is an enormously important part of the solution to get us out of the 

mess that we are in and right back on the right track. 

So thank you very much. Continue to be ever vigilant. Thank 

you. 

We will call our second panel. A vote has been scheduled for 

12:15 on an amendment by one of our colleagues to the global AIDS 

bill. And I will just ask my colleague, Senator Voinovich, how you 

would feel about heading over to the floor maybe just before 12:15, 

so we can go ahead, introduce this panel, they can begin and when 

you return, I can go vote. That way we won’t waste any time. 

Senator VOINOVICH. That is fine. 

Senator CARPER. OK, thanks. 

Gentlemen, welcome. We are delighted that you are here on this 

panel. Hubert T. Bell, Inspector General of the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission. Who appoints you, if you don’t mind my asking? Who 

is the appointing authority for the Inspector General at the NRC? 

Mr. BELL. I am nominated by the President, confirmed by the 

Senate. 

114 

Senator CARPER. I see. Thanks very much. 

David Christian, Mr. Christian, thank you very much. Nice to 

see you. President and Chief Nuclear Officer at Dominion. 

And I hope I don’t mangle this name too much. Is it Pietrangelo? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. Correct, sir. 

Senator CARPER. Mr. Anthony R. Pietrangelo, Vice President for 

Regulatory Affairs at the Nuclear Energy Institute. 

Mr. Richard Webster, Legal Director of the Eastern Environmental Law Center. Thank you for joining us today. 

Dr. Joseph Romm, Senior Fellow at the Center for American 

Progress. 

And finally, H. John Gilbertson, Jr., the Managing Director at 

Goldman Sachs and Company. 

We are delighted that you are here. We welcome your participation. We are going to try to keep this rolling, even during the 

course of this vote. We all have roughly 5 minutes to speak, then 

we will followup with questions. We are happy that you are here 

and look forward to continuing this conversation with you right 

now. 

Mr. Bell, you are up first. Your entire statement will be made 

part of the record. If you could summarize and keep it to about 5 

minutes, please. 

STATEMENT OF HON. HUBERT T. BELL, INSPECTOR GENERAL, 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION ACCOMPANIED BY: 

ANTHONY LIPUMA, DEPUTY ASSISTANT INSPECTOR GENERAL FOR AUDITS; GEORGE MULLEY, SENIOR LEVEL ASSISTANT FOR INVESTIGATIVE OPERATIONS 

Mr. BELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee. It is a pleasure to appear before you today. 

I am accompanied today by Mr. Anthony Lipuma, Deputy Assistant Inspector General for Audits, and Mr. George Mulley, Senior 

Level Assistant for Investigative Operations. 

As you know, the mission of the Office of the Inspector General 

at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is to assist the Nuclear Regulatory Commission by assuring integrity, efficiency and accountability in the agency’s programs. My office carries out this mission 

by independently and objectively conducting and supervising audits 

and investigations related to NRC’s programs and operations, preventing and detecting fraud, waste and abuse and promoting economy, efficiency and effectiveness in NRC’s programs and operations. 

Over the past year, my office has issued three reports pertaining 

to the NRC’s licensing and relicensing processes for operating nuclear power plants. These reports identify shortcomings relative to 

the agency’s review process. I would like to talk today about two 

of the reports, each of which focused on NRC’s license renewal program. 

The first report, Audit of NRC’s License Renewal Program, assessed the effectiveness of NRC’s nuclear reactor license renewal 

safety reviews. These reviews are conducted by NRC’s license renewal staff and focus on how licensees manage adverse effects of 

aging to provide reasonable assurance that plants will continue to 

115 

operate in accordance with the current licensing basis for the period of extended operations. 

The OIG audit found that NRC has developed a comprehensive 

license renewal process to evaluate applications for extended periods of operation, however, OIG identified areas where improvements would enhance program operations. 

One area identified as needing improvement pertained to license 

renewal reporting. Auditors found that NRC staff did not consistently provide adequate descriptions of review methodology or support for conclusions in license renewal reports, because NRC has 

not established a report quality assurance process to ensure adequate documentation. In 42 percent of the cases reviewed, OIG 

found identical or nearly identical word for word repetition of the 

licensee’s renewal application text in the NRC Review Team inspection and safety evaluation reports. The lack of precision in differentiating quoted and unquoted text made it difficult for a reader 

to distinguish between the licensee-provided information and NRC 

staff independent assessment methodology and conclusion. As a result, those who read the report could conclude that regulatory decisions are not adequately reviewed and documented. 

As a follow on to the audit of the NRC’s license renewal program, 

OIG issued sent a report to the Chairman of the NRC addressing 

concerns raised regarding the extent of the NRC staff review of license renewal applications. For this report, OIG’s investigative unit 

conducted a review of NRC staff’s preparation of license renewal 

safety evaluation reports that documented NRC assessments of license renewal applications for four nuclear power plants (Browns 

Ferry, Brunswick, D.C. Cook, and Oyster Creek). OIG determined 

that the license review staff conducted headquarters and onsite reviews of license renewal application materials. Staff used professional judgment to determine the extent of their onsite review of 

licensee documents and the number and nature of questions they 

posed to licensee staff and requests for additional information. 

OIG determined that between 70 and 90 percent of the NRC review of license renewal applications was performed onsite. The results of the onsite reviews were documented in license renewal 

audit reports. Based on information developed by the staff during 

its headquarters and onsite review activities, as well as written responses to NRC questions and clarifying discussions held with the 

licensee, NRC reviewers submitted their formal input to be used as 

the basis for a Safety Evaluation Report. 

The OIG report to the Chairman noted that NRC onsite license 

renewal audit reports are summary in nature. These reports document the findings of the NRC onsite review and provide support for 

the NRC conclusion in Safety Evaluation Reports. The audit reports also list the licensee documents that were reviewed during 

the NRC onsite reviews. 

Additionally, based on our review of NRC work hour data, OIG 

noted that significant numbers of hours were used by the NRC 

staff in their review of the license renewal applications for the four 

power plants reviewed by OIG. However, during its review OIG 

learned that as a standard practice the NRC staff does not preserve as permanent records copies of all licensee documents reviewed onsite or their own working papers, for example, inspector 

116 

notes. These documents provide additional direct support of the 

specifics of the NRC onsite review. The lack of licensee documents 

and NRC working papers made it difficult for OIG to verify specific 

details of the staff onsite review activities. 

In response to the OIG audit recommendations pertaining to license renewal reporting, NRC has proposed or taken specific actions intended to impose standards for report writing and ensure 

consistent implementation of license renewal reviews. These actions include updating report writing guidance and developing associated training to convey report writing standards for describing 

the license renewal review methodology and providing support for 

conclusions and license renewal reports and implementing an enhanced report review process. 

OIG is currently assessing NRC’s proposed and completed actions 

to determine whether the actions meet the intent of the recommendations. As resources permit, my staff will continue to conduct audits related to nuclear power industry licensing during Fiscal Year 2009 and beyond. Audits will assess such areas as NRC’s 

quality assurance planning for new reactors, the agency’s readiness 

to oversee the construction of new nuclear power plants, NRC’s 

vendor inspection program and other key issues pertaining to new 

reactor licensing, as well as the licensing of Independent Spent 

Fuel Storage Installation. 

Mr. Chairman, and members of the subcommittee, this concludes 

my report to you on my Office’s recent activities pertaining to 

NRC’s licensing and relicensing processes for nuclear power plants. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bell follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Mr. Bell, thank you very much for your testimony. 

Mr. Christian, again, welcome and please proceed. 

STATEMENT OF DAVID A. CHRISTIAN, PRESIDENT AND CHIEF 

NUCLEAR OFFICER, DOMINION NUCLEAR 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, I am pleased 

to be able to have the opportunity to participate today. As you 

mentioned, I am the Chief Nuclear Officer and President of Dominion’s nuclear organization. 

Dominion is one of the Nation’s largest producers of energy. We 

operate seven reactors on four sites in three States, two sites in 

Virginia with two reactors each, one site in Connecticut and one 

site in Wisconsin. We are actively involved in the Federal process 

that we believe will lead to the first new nuclear unit to be built 

in the United States in 30 years. 

I was invited here today to give you my company’s opinion and 

experience with the new nuclear licensing process. Overall, I will 

say that my observations are that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has been both professional and open in developing and implementing the new licensing process, previously referred to as the 

Part 52 process. Although there is still some work to be done, we 

believe that the goals are achievable. Continued oversight will be 

necessary and continued attention will be required to assure that 

the progress achieved through the licensing process improvements 

is sustained. 

My basis for saying that our experience with the NRC’s new licensing process is positive is that Dominion has hands-on experience with two of the three elements in the new licensing process, 

that being early site permitting and combined licenses, and we are 

actively cooperating with General Electric Hitachi Nuclear Energy 

on the third element, the design certification for the ESBWR, or 

Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor advanced design, a design which includes a combination of passive reactor safety designed in unit security, economic and reliable operation. 

In 2002, we were the first company to begin working with the 

U.S. DOE on demonstrating the early site permit process. Following our submittal, an extensive NRC staff review and public 

input and a mandatory hearing, the NRC issued our early site permit in November 2007. On the same day that we received our early 

site permit, we submitted and applied for a combined operating license for a new 1,500 megawatt unit at North Anna, some 90 miles 

from here. Dominion’s COL application was based on NRC guidance, developed with significant interactions between the public 

and the industry. The NRC acknowledged the quality of our application and completed its acceptance review in less than the prescribed time. The NRC is scheduled to complete its detailed reviews 

in August 2010. 

Our assessment of the NRC’s positioning is that they are prepared to handle a large, but not unlimited, number of applications 

from utilities and vendors. The NRC strongly encourages and encouraged the design-centered working group approach or designcentered review approach to maximize its review efficiency. Dominion supports this approach through its participation in the ESBWR 

132 

design-centered working group and its role as the lead license applicant for this design. 

The NRC has taken a number of actions to prepare for new unit 

applications and those were enumerated in Chairman Klein’s testimony. 

In sum, the NRC can issue reasonable schedules when provided 

with quality applications that meet its requirements. What this results in is applications that are accepted in a timely manner and 

review schedules that are unencumbered with conditions. 

The NRC, through its Office of New Reactors, is working to 

maintain its published schedule. In addition, much has been said 

here today about the efficiency of the license review process, and 

the timing of the license review process. It is important to remember that the concept of reviewing common issues one time for a reference application and then expecting subsequent applications to 

use that reference to reference the resolved issues promises to 

make future application reviews far more efficient. 

One aspect of the combined license process which has yet to be 

proved is to confirm that what was built is the same as what was 

licensed. This final aspect is sometimes referred to as ITAAC or Inspection Test Analyses and Acceptance Criteria. These tests are 

conducted prior to fuel load and bringing the reactor into service. 

We view this will be a challenge, but we expect to resolve it in a 

manner that ensures public health and safety is maintained. 

In conclusion, let me reiterate that our observations are that the 

NRC has been professional and open in developing and implementing the new licensing process. It is capable of implementing 

the process to license new units and the industry is capable and 

prepared to submit quality applications. Although there is some 

work still to be done to implement the new process, the goal of deploying new reactors in the U.S. appears achievable. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Christian follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Mr. Christian, thank you very much. 

Mr. Pietrangelo, you are welcomed. 

STATEMENT OF ANTHONY R. PIETRANGELO, VICE PRESIDENT, 

NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. Chairman Carper, Ranking Member 

Voinovich, I appreciate the opportunity to testify today and on behalf of the nuclear industry, thank this Subcommittee for its longstanding interest in and oversight of the NRC’s activities and the 

issues important to the continued beneficial uses of nuclear energy. 

In particular, we appreciate the leadership shown by Senator 

Carper and Senator Voinovich on key issues including infrastructure, the loan guarantee program and waste confidence that are 

critical to new plant build. My testimony today addresses the following topics: one, the performance of the 104 power reactors and 

the contribution nuclear energy makes toward the U.S. energy and 

environmental policies; two, the importance of license renewal to 

extending the value of nuclear power plant assets and NRC’s license renewal process; and three, the prospects for building new 

nuclear plants in the U.S. and the importance of an effective and 

efficient NRC licensing process. 

The U.S. nuclear fleet continues to operate at record high levels 

of safety and reliability. In 2007, the highlights include the industry’s capacity factor at 91.8 percent, an all-time high. U.S. reactors 

produced 806 billion kilowatt hours at an average production cost 

of 1.76 cents per kilowatt hour, both new industry standards. With 

this excellent performance, nuclear energy continues to generate 

about 20 percent of U.S. electricity, despite the fact that nuclear 

power plants represent only about 12 percent of the installed electric generating capacity. 

In addition, nuclear energy accounts for more than 70 percent of 

the Nation’s carbon-free electricity generation and prevented the 

emissions of CO2 equivalent to those from all passenger vehicles in 

the United States in 2007. The outstanding performance of the 

U.S. nuclear fleet, along with its contributions to our energy and 

environmental goals, provide the context and foundation for renewing the licenses of existing plants and preparations for new plant 

build. 

License renewal of nuclear power plants in this Country is founded upon technical research begun in 1982 through the nuclear 

plant aging research program established by the NRC. The program concluded that aging phenomena are manageable and should 

not preclude extended operation for reactors. The rulemaking that 

followed, 10 C.F.R. Part 54, included two fundamental principles: 

the regulatory process will ensure that the licensing basis provides 

and maintains plant safety and that the licensing basis carries forward throughout the renewed period of operation. 

The license renewal process does not attempt to duplicate the 

regulatory oversight that occurs continually at all reactors. Rather, 

it appropriately focuses on managing the effects of aging on key 

structures and components that are not routinely inspected. Applicants for renewal are required to identify the important structures 

and components within the scope of the rule. Second, they must 

identify the aging mechanisms or effects that these structures and 

145 

components are subject to. And finally, they must describe how 

they will address and manage the aging effects through plant programs and inspections. 

The NRC developed the Generic Aging Lessons Learned, or 

GALL report, to capture experience on aging effects. The report 

also captures practices acceptable to the NRC for managing those 

aging effects. Applicants routinely reference the practices detailed 

in the GALL report in their applications. This in large part explains some of the findings in the NRC Inspector General’s audit 

of the license renewal process. 

Turning to new plant build, I cannot overState the importance of 

available loan guarantee program to kick start the first wave of 

plants, and that would lower the cost of electricity to consumers. 

NEI expects four to eight plants will be deployed by the middle of 

the next decade. The industry is well aware of the areas that 

plague the construction of the existing fleet, and we have focused 

our efforts on mitigating those risks. This must be demonstrated by 

completing these first projects within schedule and budget constraints to build confidence for a more significant expansion to 

occur. 

From a licensing perspective, the NRC and the industry are on 

a steep learning curve with regard to the implementation of Part 

52. Thus far, the reviews are progressing per established schedules. 

Of utmost importance is the completion of key rulemaking activities, including Part 73 on security, aircraft impact assessments and 

the revision of the waste confidence rule that will further strengthen the current regulatory basis for NRC’s waste confidence determination. 

In addition, we expect that efficiencies in the licensing process 

will be gained as the design certifications are completed and lessons learned are incorporated from the initial early site permit and 

combined license reviews. 

Going forward, the industry’s highest priority will remain the 

continued safe and reliable operation of the existing fleet. It is this 

performance that enabled successful license renewal thus far, and 

that will sustain the recognition of nuclear energy as an indispensable element of meeting our Nation’s energy and environmental 

goals. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Pietrangelo follows:] 

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RESPONSE BY ANTHONY R. PIETRANGELO TO AN ADDITIONAL QUESTION

FROM SENATOR BOXER

Question 1. Mr. Webster’s written testimony mentioned that improving the NRC’s 

licensing procedures would actually be good for the nuclear industry because it 

would help improve public confidence and reduce resistance to the siting of new 

plants. Do you agree with his statement? Aren’t you concerned that eliminating the 

mandatory hearing requirement for new licenses would reduce public confidence in 

the NRC and the safety of new facilities? 

Response. In response to the first question, NEI agrees with the general proposition that improving the NRC’s licensing procedures should enhance public confidence in the NRC licensing process and thereby reduce public resistance to siting 

new plants. In our view, eliminating the mandatory hearing from NRC licensing reviews would affirmatively improve the NRC licensing process with no attendant decrease in protection of public health and safety and no change in opportunities for 

public participation. Discontinuing the unnecessary and duplicative reviews conducted in mandatory uncontested hearings would reduce the burden on the NRC 

Staff, the NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards (ASLB) and applicants, and 

shorten the overall licensing process for new plants. 

In response to the second question, NEI believes that eliminating mandatory 

hearings should have no effect on public confidence in the NRC, NRC licensing decisions, or the safety of new nuclear power plants. The mandatory hearing is a vestigial artifact of a different era and a different regulatory framework for commercial 

reactor licensing. The original purposes of the mandatory hearing—to provide public 

notice of the project and an additional, independent review by the NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board 

are now achieved through other, more effective NRC processes and other avenues 

for public participation and independent review. The NRC licensing process is thorough, fair, and transparent, and protects public health and safety against radiological hazard. This process clearly merits public confidence in NRC licensing decisions absent a mandatory hearing. Additionally, eliminating mandatory hearings 

would have no effect on public participation in the NRC licensing and hearing process. 

History of the Mandatory Hearing Provision: Following passage of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (AEA), the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), the predecessor of 

the NRC, issued three reactor construction permits without any public hearing or 

notice of intent. To address this lack of notice, Congress amended the AEA in 1957 

to require a hearing for each new reactor application. This change was intended to 

ensure that the public was aware of applications for a new power reactor—that is, 

the mandatory hearing served a ‘‘public notice’’ function. In 1962, Congress again 

amended the AEA to create the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, to alleviate concerns with the AEC’s dual role as both a regulator and a promoter of nuclear energy. Since 1962, the mandatory hearing provisions in the AEA have not changed. 

However, there have been substantial changes in the NRC licensing process, the 

agency’s organizational structure, and the AEA that render the mandatory hearing 

redundant and unnecessary. 

The ‘‘Public Notice’’ Function: NRC uses a variety of mechanisms to offer the public detailed information regarding new nuclear plant (or combined license (COL) applications. Before an application is submitted, letters of intent describing the location and timing of an expected COL application are available on the NRC’s website, 

http://www.nrc.gov. The NRC also holds public meetings near the proposed new reactor site to explain the licensing process and identify ways in which the public may 

participate in the process. Once the NRC receives an application for a COL or Early 

Site Permit (ESP), it publishes in the Federal Register a separate Notice of Receipt 

and Availability of an Application, a Notice of Docketing of an Application, and a 

Notice of an Opportunity to Request a Hearing. The application and related documents are available on a webpage dedicated to each proposed facility. During its review, the NRC holds additional public meetings in the vicinity of the proposed facility to solicit public input on the application. 

NEPA Considerations: The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), 

which post-dates the AEA’s mandatory hearing provision, requires NRC to conduct 

environmental reviews for each application and to provide notice and specific opportunities for the public to participate in those reviews. Even absent a mandatory 

hearing, the ‘‘public notice’’ function of the mandatory hearing would continue to be 

performed by other, more comprehensive and effective means of public communication. 

Mandatory Hearings and the Functions of the AEC/NRC: Since the mandatory 

hearing reqUirement was instituted in 1957, the regulatory function of the AEC has 

159 

been separated from the promotional function. This resulted in the creation of the 

NRC, whose function is to regulate and license commercial nuclear materials and 

facilities and conduct related research. The creation of the NRC as an independent 

regulatory agency in 1975 eliminated the structural conflict of interest that prompted the establishment of the ASLB in 1962, rendering redundant the ASLB’s original 

role as an independent reviewer of uncontested issues. 

Mandatory Hearings and the Role of the ACRS: The Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) is now reqUired by statute to conduct an extensive and independent review of the Staff’s licensing review for every new reactor application. Because the ACRS includes subject matter experts from a range of technical disciplines, the ACRS is perhaps even better-equipped to probe the NRC Staff’s review 

than the ASLB. Also, ACRS meetings are open to the public and any report issued 

by the ACRS on an application is also publicly available. Thus, the ‘‘independent 

review’’ objective of the mandatory hearing is served by ACRS review, which is 

equally independent and arguably more insightful. 

Mandatory Hearings and Public Participation: Eliminating the mandatory hearing 

would not eliminate the opportunity for the public to participate in hearings on license applications for new nuclear plants. Currently, members of the public have 

no right to participate in the NRC’s mandatory hearing. Eliminating mandatory 

hearings would therefore have no effect on the public’s right to participate in the 

NRC licensing process. Importantly, members of the public with standing would still 

be able to offer proposed contentions on the application. If proffered contentions 

were admitted, NRC Licensing Boards would still conduct a hearing on those contentions and make de novo factual findings on the contested issues raised by intervenors. This table compares the NRC reactor licensing processes and procedures at the 

time the mandatory uncontested hearing requirement was first introduced to the 

current regulatory program. 

RESPONSE BY ANTHONY R. PIETRANGELO TO AN ADDITIONAL QUESTION

FROM SENATOR CARPER

Question. Collapsing cooling towers and leaks at Vermont Yankee do not build 

public confidence in the nuclear industry. However, these are considered non-safety 

issues and are not under the jurisdiction of the NRC. Does the industry have best 

practices available—similar to NRC’s Guidelines for Aging 

Response. The industry does collect and disseminate operating experience on nonsafety-related structures, system and components through the Institute of Nuclear 

Power Operations (INPO). This includes operating experience on cooling towers as 

well as many other categories of non-safety-related equipment used to produce electricity. INPO also generates ‘‘good practice’’ documents that provide guidance on key 

aspects of operations and maintenance for both safety and non-safety systems that 

are important to plant reliability. 

A Topical Report on Cooling Tower Structure Events was published in March 

2008 by INPO that captures key observations from operating experience between 

2000 and 2007. This report is similar to the NRC’s Generic Aging Lessons Learned 

report. It details the causes and contributors to cooling tower events and provides 

considerations for improving plant practices in order to preclude such events. 

The industry recognized long ago that unreliable non-safety systems can undermine reliable electricity generation and public confidence simultaneously. Many industry programs were developed in the 1980’s to improve the operation of the balance of plant (the non-nuclear part of the plant) because of its adverse impact on 

plant capacity factors. Since that time, the industry has demonstrated steady improvement in fleet average performance to the record level of generation in 2007. 

However, we must continue to learn lessons from our operating experience to avoid 

events that both impact reliable generation and degrade public confidence in the 

overall operation of our plants. 

RESPONSES BY ANTHONY R. PIETRANGELO TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR INHOFE

Question 1. Of the Requests for Additional Information (RAI’s) that the industry 

has received, what percentage of the applicants’ responses have been returned to the 

NRC within the response deadline? 

Response. Overall, applicants have responded to more than 5000 Requests for Additional Information (RAIs) by the deadline about 80 percent of the time. That percentage rises to nearly 90 percent for the early site permit and combined license 

applicants. For design certification applicants, who have received far more RAIs, the 

percentage is apprOXimately 76 percent. 

160 

1This standard was first established by the NRC for evaluating alternative sites for new nuclear power plants in Public Serv. Co. of New Hampshire (Seabrook Station, Units 1 and 2), 

CLI0977098, 5 NRC 503, 5260930 (1977). ‘‘Obviously superior’’ was later interpreted to mean 

‘‘substantially better.’’ Rochester Gas and Elec. Corp. (Stirling Power Project, Nuclear Unit No. 

1), CLI09800923, 11 NRC 731, 737 (1980). 2NRDC v. Morton, 458 F. 2d 827 (D.C. eire 1972); Citizens Against Burlington v. Busey, 938 

F.2d 190, 195 (D.C. Cir.), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 994 (1991). 3ESP applicants must include in their ERs ‘‘an evaluation of alternative sites to determine 

whether there is any obviously superior alternative to the site proposed.’’ In this regard, the 

ER must discuss ‘‘all environmental effects of construction and operation necessary to determine 

whether there is any obViously superior alternative to the site proposed.’’ 10 CFR § 51.50(b)(1)- 

(2). For COL applicants that do not reference an ESP, NRC regulations do not contain a specific 

requirement for an evaluation of alternative sites. However, among the information to be included in the COL Environmental Report is a discussion of ‘‘alternatives to the proposed action/ 

’ which must be ‘‘sufficiently complete to aid the Commission in developing and exploring, pursuant to section 102(2)(E) of NEPA, ’appropriate alternatives to recommended courses of action 

in any proposal which involves unresolved conflicts concerning alternative uses of available resources.’ ’’ See 10 CFR 51.45(b)(3). 4See NRC Regulatory Guide 4.2, Rev. 2, ‘‘Preparation of Environmental Reports for Nuclear 

Power Stations,’’ Chapter 9 (July 1976); NUREG–1555, ‘‘NRC Environmental Standard Review 

Plan,’’ Rev. 1, Section 9.3 (July 2007). 

Note: The on-time performance for design certification applicants includes 

ESBWR design certification RAI responses since March 2007, when GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) and NRC established explicit agreements on response times for 

individual RAIs. Since submittal of the ESBWR design certification in August 2005, 

GEH’s overall on-time response rate has been approximately 32 percent; however, 

since March 2007, their on-time response rate has been roughly equivalent to the 

industry average. 

Question 2. In the hearing, Chairman Klein testified that a Continuing Resolution, if in effect until February, would impact license renewals, power uprates, and 

new reactor reviews. Does the industry have a clear understanding of the criteria 

that will be used to prioritize reviews if the NRC must cope with a funding shortfall? 

Response. The industry understands that NRC’s first priority is the safety oversight of the existing fleet of operating plants, whether there is a Continuing Resolution or not. We also understand that if a Continuing Resolution is in effect until 

February, and assuming the NRC is funded at its Fiscal Year 2008 levels, that reviews already underway would not be impacted. The impact would be on newly submitted applications beginning in Fiscal Year 2009. 

Question 3. For applications to construct new reactors at sites with existing units, 

should the NRC require consideration of alternate sites under NEPA, without an 

indication of new and significant information that calls into question the NRC’s 

prior determination that the site was acceptable? 

Response. The requirement for an evaluation of alternative sites is based on Section 102(2)(C)(iii) of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Consistent with 

NEPA’s mandate that reasonable alternatives to an action be evaluated, the site selection process focuses on those alternative sites considered to be reasonable considering the purpose of the application. The alternative site review is designed to determine whether there is an ‘‘obviously superior’’ site, in terms of environmental impacts and economic costs, compared to the proposed site.1 It is well-established that 

NEPA’s requirement to examine alternatives is subject to a ‘‘rule of reason.’’ 2 Agencies need only discuss those alternatives that are reasonable and that ‘‘will bring 

about the ends’’ of the proposed action. Hydro Resources, Inc. (P.O. Box 15910, Rio 

Rancho, NM 87174), CLI 

01–4, 53 NRC 31, 55 (2001). 

NRC regulations require Early Site Permit (ESP), construction permit (CP) and 

combined license (COL) applicants to address certain topics, including alternate 

sites, in their Environmental Reports (ERs). See 10 CFR 51.50(a) and (c); 

52.17(a)(2). The requirement that COL applicants conduct an alternative site analysis is less explicit than that for ESP applicants; 3 nevertheless, this obligation 

clearly applies to all ESP and COL applicants, including those who propose to construct a new reactor at a site with existing units (a so-called ‘‘brown field’’ site).4

The NRC Environmental Standard Review Plan (ESRP), which contains non-binding NRC Staff gUidance for reviewing applicants’ Environmental Reports, currently 

recognizes as a ‘‘special case’’ reviewing an alternative site analysis conducted for 

a new plant to be co-located at an existing reactor site. This guidance illuminates 

agency expectations that the scope of the alternative site review in this situation 

need not reflect the same level of evaluation: 

161 

5The evaluation factors presented in NUREG–1555, Ch. 9.3., Appendix A, provide an expansive list of assessment requirements that is representative of a new site selection process. A subset of these factors would arguably be more appropriate when evaluating an existing site. 

Recognize that there will be special cases in which the proposed site was not selected on the basis of a systematic site-selection process. Examples include plants 

proposed to be constructed on the site of an existing nuclear power plant preViously 

found acceptable on the basis of a NEPA review and/or demonstrated to be enVironmentally satisfactory on the basis of operating experience, and sites assigned or allocated to an applicant by a State government from a list of State approved powerplant sites. For such cases, the reviewer should analyze the applicant’s site-selection 

process only as it applies to candidate sites other than the proposed site, and the 

site-comparison process may be restricted to a site-by-site comparison of these candidates with the proposed site. The site selection process is the same for this case 

except for the fact that the proposed site is not selected from among the candidate 

sites based on a site by site comparison. ESRP, NUREG–1555, Rev. 1, p. 9.3–12 

(July 2007). 

Generally consistent with other NRC regulatory guidance in Regulatory Guide 4.2 

(which is directed at applicants preparing Environmental Reports), this discussion 

expands the gUidance for ‘‘Candidate Areas’’ and ‘‘Potential Sites’’ to focus on a 

more elaborate, top down site selection process—beginning with Regions of Interest 

(ROI), then extending to screening candidate areas, identifying potential sites, and 

screening candidate sites, and then selecting the proposed site and alternative sites. 

While this is an appropriate process for establishing a newly licensed ‘‘green field’’ 

site, it may not offer the most logical or expeditious approach for a site that is colocating at an existing nuclear site. (Many existing nuclear sites were already developed to have multiple units where the environmental factors were addressed during 

initial site selection review and approval.) 

This ‘‘special case’’ affords the NRC Staff reviewer flexibility in assessing the adequacy of alternative site reviews on a case-by-case basis. Arguably, however, the 

guidance could go further in recognizing that considerable environmental and operational information about the impacts of a nuclear plant exists with respect to each 

commercial reactor site, and that such information could preclude the need for a 

typical broad site alternative site review process. In particular, where an applicant 

seeks to add a nuclear unit at an existing nuclear site, a more limited assessment 

may be sufficient to demonstrate that green field or non-nuclear brown field sites 

are not obviously superior. An existing nuclear site would have been selected originally based on a comprehensive evaluation and determination that no obViously superior alternative in the region exists. Also, an existing nuclear site may have been 

originally intended and evaluated for additional nuclear units that were not built. 

The characteristics and the impacts of operation at existing nuclear sites are well 

known. If this information demonstrates no major environmental impediments to 

adding units at the existing nuclear site (no factors that would make the development of a new site enVironmentally preferable), green field and non-nuclear brown 

field sites should arguably be exempted, at least in part, from detailed site-specific 

consideration. 

Under such circumstances, NEPA’s rule of reason should not require COL applicants to scour a region to identify and evaluate new potential sites, or for NRC, in 

turn, to perform independent evaluation of those sites. As the ESRP states, the purpose of this evaluation process is not to determine that the applicant has selected 

the best site, but ‘‘to determine if any candidate site can be judged as environmentally preferable and, if so, obViously superior to the applicant’s proposed site.’’ 

Another, less laborious process for determining that an obviously superior site does 

not exist may be to allow consideration of fewer alternatives, and/or reduce the 

scope of evaluation factors.5

COL applicants may consider economic factors in choosing to co-locate new plants 

at existing sites. Additionally, unless there are significant environmental concerns 

with an existing site, the incremental increase in environmental impact necessarily 

would be much less than the impacts for a new site. A substantial expenditure of 

time and resources to evaluate multiple alternative options would not provide useful 

conclusions and would not be necessary to satisfy NEPA. 

The ‘‘special case’’ discussion in the NRC Environmental Standard Review Plan 

quoted above indicates that NRC is forgoing the initial evaluation process and instead would apply the ‘‘candidate site’’ selection phase. However, the application of 

the ‘‘candidate site’’ portion of the selection process is also not proper for existing 

nuclear sites. The candidate site selection process, as described in the ESRP, is one 

sequential step of the more extensive process. As discussed in the ESRP, the result 

of that process would be three to five alternative sites in addition to the preferred 

162 

6Tennessee Valley Authority (Watts Bar Nuclear Plant, Units 1 and 2), ALAB–413, 5 NRC 

1418, 1421 (1977). 

site. That selection process arguably should not be required for an applicant that 

proposes to use a viable existing nuclear plant site. Instead, NRC should consider 

revising the ESRP to set forth guidance for those cases where an existing nuclear 

site appears to be the most appropriate option. Under such an approach, applicants 

would perform as-needed comparisons against the existing site. That approach 

should satisfy the NEPA requirement to determine whether any other candidate site 

is enVironmentally preferable to—and, if so, ‘‘obviously superior’’ to—the applicant’s 

proposed site. 

Question 4. How should the Commission address contentions that challenge the 

cost of building a new plant based on the basis of historical cost overruns? 

Response. The NRC should disposition proposed contentions challenging the estimated cost of building a new nuclear plant using the same criteria the agency applies to other types of proposed contentions in NRC licensing proceedings. Because 

NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards evaluate each proposed contention on its 

own merits, generalizations as to the admissibility of ‘‘cost-related’’ contentions in 

NRC licensing proceedings for new plants are not determinative. However, the limited regulatory jurisdiction of the NRC presumably limits (and may preclude) the 

adjudication of many cost-based challenges in NRC licensing hearings. 

Notably, NRC’s jurisdictional limits do not foreclose opportunities to address costrelated concerns relating to new nuclear power plants. Economic regulatory agencies 

and processes outside of the NRC hearing process are in place at both the State and 

Federal levels to evaluate new generation needs, to ensure that new plant costs are 

prudently incurred, and to consider whether power sales at both the retail and 

wholesale levels are just and reasonable. Responsibilities for energy supply and 

planning, and for the economic regulation of new energy projects, lie with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and State public service commissions. 

The Scope of NRC Regulatory Jurisdiction: Under the Atomic Energy Act and the 

National Environmental Policy Act, the NRC is tasked with specific regulatory responsibilities related to public health and safety, common defense and security, and 

protection of the environment. Responsibilities for energy supply and planning, and 

for the economic regulation of new energy projects, lies with other State and Federal 

Government agencies, such as FERC and State public service commissions. Recognizing the differing roles of various Federal and State regulators, the NRC has consistently found, for example, that the economic interests of a ratepayer or taxpayer 

do not confer standing to raise economic issues in the NRC hearing process.6

COL Applicants Must Provide Plant Cost Information: The scope of NRC licensing 

hearings (and, consequently, the scope of contentions that may be admitted in a licensing hearing) is limited by the nature of the application and relevant Commission regulations. Similarly, the findings that NRC must make concerning project 

costs prior to issuance of a combined operating license (COL) are limited. Nevertheless, COL applicants must submit certain cost information to NRC, including an estimate of total construction costs for the facility and the source(s) of funds to cover 

these costs. See 10 CFR 50.33(f)(1)-(3); see also 10 CFR 52.77. Further, NRC regulations in 10 CFR 50.33(f)(1)-(3) governing COL applications now require applicants 

to submit: (i) information demonstrating that the applicant possesses or has reasonable assurance of obtaining the funds necessary to cover estimated construction 

costs and related fuel cycle costs; (ii) estimates of the total facility construction costs 

and related fuel cycle costs; (iii) the source(s) of funds to cover these costs. Section 

50.33(f)(1). Additionally, the COL applicant must submit: (iv) information demonstrating that the applicant possesses or has reasonable assurance of obtaining the 

funds necessary to cover estimated operation costs for the period of the license; (v) 

estimates for total annual operating costs for each of the first 5 years of operation; 

(Vi) the source(s) of funds to cover these costs. Section 50.33(f)(2). Other information 

that NRC may require to enable it to determine an applicant’s financial qualifications is addressed in 10 CFR 50.33(f)(4). 

Historical cost overruns for nuclear units constructed in the 1970’s and 1980’s 

were based on many complex historical factors that are not necessarily attributable 

to today’s NRC licensees or the current economic environment. To be admissible 

under NRC rules, proposed contentions that challenge estimated project costs or an 

applicant’s proposed funding plan must be focused on the applicant’s analysis and 

plan as presented in the licensing documents. The proposed contention must articulate a specific challenge—with the necessary basis—to that current cost analysis. It 

should not be sufficient (and, in our view, it is not sufficient under NRC requirements) simply to allege that historical overruns existed and therefore create an adVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00166 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
163 

7NRC rules require petitioners who request a hearing and/or seek to intervene and participate 

in an NRC licensing hearing to ‘‘set forth with particularity the contentions sought to be raised.’’ 

The provisions for basis and specificity in proposed contentions require that the petitioner: 

missible issue. Any specific proposed contentions related to the cost of building a 

new facility will be evaluated carefully by the Commission for admissibility in an 

NRC licensing hearing.7 Other Forums for Considering Plant Cost: Additionally, 

proposed contentions primarily related to electric rates or prudency concerns should 

not be admitted in NRC proceedings because they are more appropriately addressed 

in other forums. Issues related to new project planning and siting, including the 

costs of a proposed project and alternatives, normally will be considered in a State 

public service commission process. Issues related to costs actually incurred, and 

whether those costs can be recovered in rates, are then considered after the fact, 

based on actual experience, rather than the now-dated experience of the 1970’s and 

1980’s. With respect to the cost overruns experienced for some earlier generation nuclear plants, there were substantial disallowances as a result of these prudency proceedings, demonstrating that the economic regulatory process functions effectively, 

independent of the NRC process. • Provide a specific statement of the issue of law or fact to be raised or controverted. • Explain the basis for the proposed contention. 

• Demonstrate that the issue raised is within the scope of the proceeding. 

• Demonstrate that the issue raised is ‘‘material’’ to the findings the NRC must 

make to support the licensing action. • Provide a concise statement of the alleged facts or expert opinions that support 

the petitioner’s position on the issue, and on which the petitioner intends to rely 

at the hearing, together with references to the specific sources and documents the 

petitioner intends to use to support his/her position. • Provide sufficient information to show that a genuine dispute exists with the 

applicant/licensee on a material issue of law or fact. This information must include 

references to specific portions of the application that the petitioner disputes and the 

reasons supporting each dispute. Alternatively, the petitioner must identify and explain the relevance of information allegedly absent from the application. See 10 CFR 

2.309(f)(1)(i)-(vi). 

For new nuclear plants, the ‘‘justness and reasonableness’’ of a generating company’s wholesale power sales are subject to review and approval by the FERC under 

Section 205 of the Federal Power Act. At FERC, generating companies can request 

authority under Section 205 to sell power wholesale at negotiated, market-based 

rates, or at cost-based rates. With respect to market-based sales, FERC employs rigorous market share analyses to determine whether the generator has the ability to 

impose price increases on power purchasers such that they are required to pay more 

than they otherwise would in the market. FERC does not directly determine the 

sales price; rather, the generator must be able to negotiate rates that are sufficient 

to cover its carrying costs, costs of production, and a reasonable return. When generating companies seek to establish cost-based rates, FERC reviews the elements of 

the company’s cost of service (including the project capital costs) to determine 

whether those costs support a rate that is just and reasonable overall. In setting 

the authorized rate, FERC has authority to consider the prudence of the generator’s 

expenditures and whether the overall investment is ‘‘used and useful’’ for public 

utility service. 

Similar authority exists at the State level to review and approve the justness and 

reasonableness of the price of power sold at retail. States with retail electric choice 

permit consumers to select the most economical supplies from competitive electric 

suppliers, or to purchase electricity from the incumbent utility at pre-determined 

‘‘provider of last resort’’ rates established by the public service commission. In states 

without retail choice, State public service commissions review the rates charged for 

retail electric supply service, including the prudency of the costs incurred, to prOVide the service. When an electric utility purchases power at wholesale from a generating company, the states are typically obligated to accept the rate established by 

FERC as just and reasonable and allow a full pass-through of the costs. (An exception to this rule allows states to disallow the cost of purchased power if the purchasing utility did not take advantage of an opportunity to purchase more economic 

supplies.) 

Question 5. How should the Commission address contentions that challenge the 

safety of new units based on historical events such as Three Mile Island or 

Chernobyl? 

Response. As stated in response to Question 3, above, the NRC should evaluate 

proposed contentions challenging the safety of new nuclear plants on the basis of 

164 

8‘‘Final Rule, Nuclear Power Plant Ucense Renewal,’’ 56 Fed. Reg. 64,943, 64,945 (Dec. 13, 

1991) (promulgating the NRC’s initial license renewal regulations). Regarding the adequacy of 

its regulatory oversight process, the Commission further stated: ‘‘The Commission cannot conclude that its regulation of operating reactors is ’perfect’ and cannot be improved, that all safety 

issues applicable to all plants have been resolved, or that all plants have been and at all times 

in the future will operate in perfect compliance with all NRC requirements. However, based 

upon its review of the regulatory programs in this rulemaking, the Commission does conclude 

that (a) its program of oversight is sufficiently broad and rigorous to establish that the added 

discipline of a formal license renewal review against the full range of current safety requirements would not add significantly to safety, and (b) such a review is not needed to ensure that 

continued operation during the period of extended operation is not inimical to the public health 

and safety.’’ Id 

‘‘historical events’’ such as the accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl under 

the same standard the agency applies to all other proposed contentions in NRC licensing proceedings. Because NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards evaluate 

each proposed contention on its own merits, the admissibility of a hypothetical contention in an NRC licensing proceeding cannot be addressed adequately in the abstract. Long-established NRC requirements for admission of contentions are likely 

to preclude the adjudication of broadly based safety challenges that lack an adequate basis and adequate specificity. 

NRC rules of practice require petitioners who request a hearing and/or seek to 

intervene and participate in an NRC licensing hearing to ‘‘set forth with particularity the contentions sought to be raised.’’ The provisions for basis and specificity 

in proposed contentions require that the petitioner: 

• Provide a specific statement of the issue of law or fact to be raised or controverted. 

• explain the basis for the proposed contention. 

• Demonstrate that the issue raised is within the scope of the proceeding. 

• Demonstrate that the issue raised is ‘‘material’’ to the findings the NRC must 

make to support the licensing action. 

• Provide a concise statement of the alleged facts or expert opinions that support 

the petitioner’s position on the issue, and on which the petitioner intends to rely 

at the hearing, together with references to the specific sources and documents the 

petitioner intends to use to support his/her position. 

• Provide sufficient information to show that a genuine dispute exists with the 

applicant/licensee on a material issue of law or fact. This information must include 

references to specific portions of the application that the petitioner disputes and the 

reasons supporting each dispute. Alternatively, the petitioner must identify and explain the relevance of information allegedly absent from the application. See 10 CFR 

2.309(f)(1)(i)-(vi). 

Given this standard for admissibility of contentions in NRC licensing hearings for 

COL applications, a proposed contention that challenges the safety of a new reactor 

based solely on historical events such as the events at Three Mile Island or 

Chernobyl, without more, likely would be rejected. 

Moreover, generalized contentions like those described in this question appear to 

ignore the fact that NRC constantly takes into account the results of research and 

operational experience in developing and modifying its ongoing regulatory oversight 

process. That process applies to all existing nuclear plants licensed by the NRC, and 

it also will apply to those new reactors that may be constructed and operated under 

the combined license (COL) process. The Commission has described this oversight 

process as follows: ‘‘Since initial licensing, each operating plant has continually been 

inspected and reviewed as a result of new information gained from operating experience. Ongoing regulatory processes provide reasonable assurance that, as new issues 

and concerns arise, measures needed to ensure that operation is not inimical to the 

public health and safety and common defense and security are ’backfitted’ onto the 

plants.’’8

The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 establishes a ‘‘comprehensive regulatory framework for the ongoing review of nuclear power plants located in the United States.’’ 

County of Rockland II. NRC, 709 F.2d 766, 769 (2d Cir. 1983). Under the AEA, the 

NRC is charged with the responsibility to ‘‘ensure, through its licensing and regulatory functions, that the generation and transmission of nuclear power does not unreasonably threaten the public welfare.’’ Id. Consistent with its mandate, the NRC 

promulgates rules and regulations governing the construction and operation of nuclear power plants. Id. 

Moreover, when a reactor is licensed, the NRC makes a comprehensive determination that the design, construction, and proposed operation of the facility satisfies 

agency requirements and provides reasonable assurance of adequate protection to 

165 

9See 56 Fed. Reg. 64,943, 64,947. 

10See 71 Fed. Reg. 74,848, 74,854 (Dec. 13, 2006) (NRC Denial of Petitions for Rulemaking 

from Andrew J. Spano and Joseph C. Scarpelli); see also 56 Fed. Reg. 64,943, 64,947. 

the public health and safety and common defense and security. See 56 Fed. Reg. 

64,943, 64,947. Each nuclear plant has a ‘‘current licensing basis’’ (CLB), a term of 

art that encompasses the gamut of NRC requirements applicable to a specific facility over its entire license term. The current licensing basis includes, for example, 

all license conditions, orders, exemptions, and licensee commitments that are part 

of the docket of that facility’s license (including responses to NRC bulletins, generic 

letters, enforcement actions and other commitments documented in NR safety evaluations or licensee event reports)— 

pius all of the NRC regulatory requirements with which the licensee must comply. 

Significantly, the CLB does not remain fixed or static. Rather, as is true for the regulatory process generally, the CLB evolves over the term of the license, as new requirements are imposed on the plant’s existing licensing basis to address ongoing 

NRC regulatory requirements.9

A proposed contention based solely on historical events would necessarily assume 

NRC has not imposed new technical requirements over time to further enhance nuclear power plant safety. Such an assumption is completely incorrect, as emphasized 

by the follOWing 2006 discussion by the Commission itself: 

The NRC notes that the regulatory process considers new scientific and technical 

knowledge since plants were initially licensed and imposes new requirements on licensees as justified. The NRC engages in a large number of regulatory activities 

that, when considered together, constitute a regulatory process that provides ongoing assurance that the licensing basis of nuclear power plants provides an acceptable level of safety. This process includes research, inspections, audits, investigations, evaluations of operating experience, and regulatory actions to resolve identified issues. These activities include consideration of new scientific or technical information. The NRC’s activities may result in changes to the licensing basis for nuclear 

power plants through issuance of new or revised regulations, and the issuance of 

orders or confirmatory action letters. Operating experience, research, or the results 

of new analyses are also issued by the NRC through documents such as bulletins, 

generic letters, regulatory information summaries, and information notices. In this 

way, the NRC’s consideration of new information provides ongoing assurance that 

the licensing basis for the design and operation of all nuclear power plants provide 

an acceptable level of safety.10

Senator CARPER. Mr. Pietrangelo, thank you for that testimony. 

Mr. Webster, before we recognize you and Dr. Romm and Mr. 

Gilbertson, the vote that has occurred, we are about halfway 

through that vote. Senator Voinovich went over earlier, but the 

vote had not started. So we will recess the Subcommittee for probably 10 minutes, but we will be right back. I just ask that you 

make yourselves comfortable, take a break. No smoking. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. We will be back shortly. Thanks for your patience. 

[Recess.] 

Senator CARPER. We will resume now. Thank you, Mr. Webster, 

for being in the on-deck box for the last 10 minutes. We are glad 

you are here, and are looking forward to your testimony. Thanks 

for coming. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD WEBSTER, LEGAL DIRECTOR, 

EASTERN ENVIRONMENTAL LAW CENTER 

Mr. WEBSTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Voinovich. It 

is a great pleasure to be here. I am Richard Webster, from the 

Eastern Environmental Law Center. 

Before I go on, I would just like to say, if you have any trouble 

with my very thick New Jersey accent, feel free to stop me and I 

can clarify for you. 

166 

[Laughter.] 

Mr Webster. Basically, 40-year old reactors, they are really like 

old cars that have been improved and given a new paint job for the 

purpose of resale. They look great, but you have to really tap the 

panels to make sure there is no rust underneath. In the case of 

Oyster Creek, we, the intervenors, have tapped those panels, and 

we found some of them are almost rusted through. As we probed 

further, with the help of the Inspector General and a number of 

States attorneys general, we realized that NRC staff was not effectively tapping those panels. They are really admiring the paint job 

and saying everything looks good. 

We believe there are two broad classes of problems. One is with 

the regulations themselves, regarding relicensing, the hearing process and safety. The other concerns agency safety culture, which 

leads to a lack of thoroughness on behalf of the NRC staff. We believe the lessons of Davis-Besse were either never learned or quickly forgotten. 

In terms of the regulatory problems, the relicensing rules don’t 

require a comprehensive look at whether safety standards could be 

improved. What happens over time is that the old plants licensing 

basis basically stays about the same, the margins decline slightly. 

The new plants have higher standards applied. Relicensing would 

be the opportunity to close that gap and require higher standards 

for old plants. That opportunity is being missed. There is no attempt whatsoever to improve, well, actually that is not quite true. 

There is a minor attempt, but in many areas, such as the storage 

of spent fuel, evacuation plans and so forth, there is no attempt to 

improve the current licensing basis. 

Second, as Commissioner Jaczko mentioned, the scope is extremely narrow. For the moment, relicensing, the safety regulations only concern the aging managing of long-lived passive components. They fail to look at everything else such as vulnerability to 

terrorism, evacuation plans and spent fuel storage, even though we 

know that many issues that currently present themselves were not 

examined during initial licensing, which remember was nearly 40 

years ago. Even for the narrow issues that are reviewed, there is 

no de novo review, so there is an assumption that if it has already 

been signed off on, everything is fine. 

The current relicensing process relies upon the ongoing safety 

regulations to solve all the problems, basically. That would be OK, 

if those ongoing regulations were perfect. Unfortunately, like most 

things in life, they are not. At minimum, the relicensing process 

therefore needs to review the ongoing safety processes and review 

compliance with the licensing basis. 

I think there are many examples of issues where the NRC has 

allowed industry the benefit of the doubt in terms of safety and has 

allowed these issues to drag on for far too long. Fire safety is an 

example, Davis-Besse is another example. 

Now, turning to the safety culture problems, we found many examples of these. And these have come out primarily through public 

participation. At Oyster Creek, when the staff assessed that the 

primary containment might not meet the engineering code, instead 

of taking action to try to improve that primary containment, they 

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ble. Really, in a rare moment of agreement, both the licensee and 

the intervenors thought the code was applicable. In effect, the NRC 

staff wanted to take the same approach to safety as a well-known 

Supreme Court opinion took regarding obscenity: they know it 

when they see it. Unsurprisingly, the ASLB, the board rejected the 

staff’s completely subjective approach. 

This shows two things. First, we need safety culture improvements. Second, we need clear statements of what safety standards 

plants must be required to meet. At the moment, we ended up litigating all the way through the hearing process what the safety 

standards were. That simply doesn’t make sense. Both the public, 

the owners of the plants and potential investors need to know what 

the safety standards are. I don’t quite understand how you can regulate safety effectively with unclear standards. 

Second example, in the Vermont Yankee proceeding, the petitioners pointed out a defect in the metal fatigue calculations. It 

turned out that the NRC had failed to spot that defect during the 

relicensing of nine other reactors. 

Now, we have a lot of prescriptions for solutions, and they basically involve more transparency, more transparency to empower 

and encourage citizens to participate in reactor oversight. This 

could include funding of citizens groups, which has been a longstanding recommendation since Three Mile Island, never been 

done; access to licensee documents and more agency notification of 

problems and events. We need to change administrative procedures 

to allow citizens a fair process. At the moment, and I have been 

through this process, I can tell you, this process is like being Alice 

in Wonderland at a communist show trial. The timing is so strict 

that you can have an issue admitted yesterday, you might be able 

to have an issue admitted tomorrow, but you can never have an 

issue admitted today. That is why 44 relicensings went through 

with no hearing whatsoever. 

Now, even if you get Alice to Wonderland and you get a hearing, 

you can’t effectively represent the clients at that hearing, you can’t 

cross-examine witnesses, you can’t depose witnesses. And the NRC 

staff participate as a party, and they nearly always oppose the public. Senator Carper, you asked the question earlier, did the staff assist the licensee. I can tell you in my hearing, the staff actually 

tried to exclude two of my exhibits, even though the licensee was 

ready to consent to let them in. 

So in conclusion, the experience in relicensing shows that the 

alarms regarding nuclear safety are ringing. But like the Peach 

Bottom guards, the NRC is snoozing. We have to make sure we 

don’t relicense rust buckets, and further undermine the public’s 

confidence in the industry. Public participation works to highlight 

safety problems, but the NRC has tried to restrict meaningful participation as much as possible. Even today, the NRC is now proposing, it appears, or at least three of the four commissioners are 

now saying that mandatory hearings should be abandoned. That is 

completely the wrong direction. Public confidence will only be increased by greater transparency, not less. 

Unless we increase public confidence, nuclear power will end up 

being in the cross-hairs of an intense battle. No good solution will 

be developed. 

168 

So what we need to do is we need to encourage and invigorate 

meaningful public participation. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Webster follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Mr. Webster, thank you very much. 

Dr. Romm, you are recognized at this time. 

STATEMENT OF JOSEPH ROMM, SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER 

FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS ACTION FUND 

Mr. ROMM. Mr. Chairman, Senator Voinovich, I am delighted to 

be here. I was Special Assistant for Policy and Planning to Deputy 

Secretary Bill White from 1993 to 1995. He had oversight responsibility for all the energy programs, including nuclear energy. Then 

I went on to be Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary and then Acting Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. 

Senator CARPER. What years did that encompass, please? 

Mr. ROMM. From 1993 to 1998, I was at the Department of Energy, the first two as Special Assistant, and then 3 years at the Office of Efficiency and Renewables. 

I was asked to address the cost issue here. I have three main 

points. First, the licensing process should not be expedited because 

the economic and safety risks are too high. Second, nuclear power 

has become so expensive, it is unlikely to achieve net growth by 

mid-century without tens of billions of dollars more in Government 

subsidies. And third, Congress should focus Federal support on energy efficiency and renewables, because they have now become better bets than nuclear power. 

The first point I think is that since the nuclear action could have 

such harsh consequences with costs ultimately borne by the American taxpayer, Congress must enforce the strictest safety standards. If power plants take six to 10 years to build, that is because 

the industry has failed to develop and standardize a limited set of 

simple, modular, fail-safe reactor designs that could tap into a cognitive scale for mass production. In the American market, there are 

at least five new designs. 

I don’t think delays are due to red tape. Nuclear plants face similar delays in other countries. Why? Quality problems. The first advanced reactor design built in the west in Finland is already 25 

percent over budget and 2 years behind schedule because of 

‘‘flawed wells for the reactor’s steel liner, unusable water coolant 

pipes and suspect concrete in the foundation.’’ 

Second, once billed as too cheap to meter, nuclear power simply 

became ‘‘too costly to matter,’’ as the economists put it back in 

2001. Yet nuclear power is now triple the price that it was in 2001. 

An industry trade magazine headlined a recent article, ‘‘For some 

utilities the capital cost of nuclear power plants are prohibitive.’’ 

Nuclear economic expert Jim Harding e-mailed me that his current 

reasonable estimate for levelized cost range for nuclear power is 12 

to 17 cents per kilowatt hour lifetime, much higher than current 

U.S. electric rates. 

Last August, AEP CEO Michael Morris said he was not planning 

to build any new nuclear plants: ‘‘I am not convinced we will see 

a new nuclear station before probably the 2020 time line. So I do 

not consider nuclear a near-term solution.’’ 

In October, Florida Power and Light testified that two units totaling 2,200 megawatts would cost up to $18 billion, which is a 

stunning $8,000 per kilowatt. Progress Energy told Florida reguVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00191 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
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lators that twin 1,100 megawatt plants would cost $14 billion, 

which triples estimates the utility offered little more than a year 

ago. Its 200 mile transmission project would add $3 billion more. 

Total costs, again, nearly $8,000 a kilowatt. Nuclear plants are now 

so expensive that Duke Power actually refused to reveal cost estimates for a proposed plant in the Carolinas, and a recent California Public Utility Commission study puts the cost of power from 

new nuclear plants again at 15 cents per kilowatt hour. Energy efficiency, wind and solar all beat that price. 

To date, California’s efficiency programs have cut total electricity 

demand by 40,000 gigawatt hours for two to three cents per kilowatt hour. California plans to more than double those savings by 

2020. If that effort would reproduce nationwide, efficiency would 

deliver enough savings to avoid the need to build any new U.S. 

power plants for two decades. A May report by this Energy Department concluded Americans could get 300 gigawatts of wind by 2030 

at a cost of under 8.5 cents per kilowatt hour. 

Utilities in the Southwest are already contracting for concentrated solar thermal power at 14 to 15 cents per kilowatt hour. 

The Western Governors Association expects that the price will drop 

to 12 cents a kilowatt hour within 5 years. That would include 6 

hours of storage capacity, which would allow concentrated solar to 

follow the electric load from early morning to late evening and 

eliminate the intermittence issue associated with solar. Even solar 

photovoltaics with battery storage can now be installed cheaper 

than what Florida ratepayers are being asked for nuclear power. 

In conclusion, nuclear power’s many limitations, especially its escalating price, will constrain its growth in America. Merely maintaining the current percentage of generation provided by nuclear 

through the year 2050 will probably require building some 75 large 

replacement reactors with a total cost approaching $1 trillion, and 

that won’t happen without massive congressional subsidies. A U.S. 

cap and trade system, such as you propose, will help all low carbon 

energy resources, including nuclear. After 50 years and nearly $100 

billion in subsidies from Congress, if new nuclear plants can’t compete in this emerging low carbon market, then frankly, it doesn’t 

deserve yet more taxpayer support or any expedited licensing. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Romm follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Dr. Romm, thank you very much. Thanks for 

being here and thank you for your testimony. 

Mr. Gilbertson, please proceed. 

STATEMENT OF H. JOHN GILBERTSON, JR., MANAGING 

DIRECTOR, GOLDMAN, SACHS AND COMPANY 

Mr. GILBERTSON. Chairman Carper, Senator Voinovich, good 

afternoon. My name is John Gilbertson. I am a managing director 

of Goldman, Sachs. I want to thank you both and the Committee 

for the opportunity to discuss financial perspectives on nuclear 

power. 

Our firm works as an advisor and provider of capital to integrated electric utilities and power generation companies, including 

most of those who have recently filed or intend to file a new COL 

application. We have also engaged in frequent discussions with 

Members of Congress, their staff, the Department of Energy, the 

Administration regarding implementation of the Title 17 loan guarantee program. In this work, we have studied the question of how 

to finance the new construction of nuclear units. 

The capital markets today look favorably on the incumbent U.S. 

fleet of 104 units, and upon the companies who operate them. It 

is well understood by investors and lenders that the existing fleet 

is safe, reliable, low-cost, profitable and non-emitting. These characteristics have also translated into superior investment performance. The performance of the U.S. nuclear industry is, I believe, 

one of the great turnaround stories in business history. However, 

this turnaround did not occur by accident. Rather, it was the natural result of economic opportunity, competitive pressures, a natural learning curve, rigorous regulatory scrutiny with strict emphasis on safety, the systematic sharing of best practices, regular process improvements, and consolidation of fleet ownership, all of 

which have driven nuclear operators to achieve a noteworthy 

record of continuous improvement. 

The financial markets also recognize that nuclear needs to become a larger portion of the U.S. fuel mix. Once they are built, new 

nuclear units are expected to supply reliable power at all-in hourly 

rates that are comparatively high by recent standards, but more 

than competitive against the expected cost of power in the next 10 

to 15 years. This cost advantage is expected to widen further as the 

U.S. pursues climate protection through a cap and trade system 

which puts an explicit cost on emitted carbon. 

This need for more nuclear power is also completely independent 

of the expected growth in energy conservation and in other sources 

of clean energy, such as wind or solar. Even in the most ambitious 

growth scenarios for conservation, wind and solar, the U.S. carbon 

footprint would be further reduced if there is also significant 

growth in nuclear share of the fuel mix. And this need would only 

be amplified when plug-in vehicles reach commercial scale, thus 

creating the opportunity to use domestically produced clean electricity as a substitute for imported oil. 

However, the markets also recognize that the challenge of new 

construction is very difficult. Project sponsors must spend large 

amounts of capital for long lead-time procurement before the 

project has been licensed by the NRC and before the construction 

206 

schedule is set. They must do so at a time of steep commodity inflation, a smaller work force for nuclear construction, and sharply increased global demand for construction services. As a result, the 

project cost estimates have risen dramatically in the past year and 

are expected to continue rising. In the eyes of lenders and investors, these projects will face the potential risk of serious delay and 

cost overruns. 

In the U.S., the companies who would undertake nuclear new 

build are under-sized in comparison to the size of each project. The 

fragmented structure of the U.S. power industry leaves these companies, even the largest ones, constrained to assume the risks in 

such a project. On their own, we expect very few of these companies would pursue nuclear new build, because their existing capital 

structures simply cannot withstand the construction risks. 

In this regard, the Title 17 loan guarantee program is essential 

to restarting the nuclear build cycle in the United States. However, 

this program too is under-sized in relation to the need. The current 

$18.5 billion in guarantee authority will be enough to support possibly three new projects. There are quite a few credible and capable 

nuclear operators who are ready to pursue similar projects, but 

only if they qualify for a Title 17 guarantee. 

The NRC is seen by investors and lenders as a significant contributor to this industry turnaround, especially to the notable improvements in safety and reliability of the existing fleet. In terms 

of new build, investors are encouraged by the streamlined nature 

of the COL process. However, this process has not yet been tested 

in the current build cycle, and markets are still wary of the potential for intervention and prolonged delay. 

The best remedy for this concern will be an actual licensing experience that is both timely and rigorous. As new licenses are granted, investors will pay close attention to the length of time from 

start to finish. The markets will look for the NRC to meet current 

timing expectations and if possible, to shorten this time period in 

subsequent applications, while maintaining the rigor of its decisions with safety always being the highest priority. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you again for the opportunity to speak here 

today. I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gilbertson follows:] 

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Senator CARPER. Mr. Gilbertson, thank you. 

Didn’t you join us on a roundtable that we had a while ago? 

Mr. GILBERTSON. Yes, about a month ago. 

Senator CARPER. Thanks for coming that day, too. 

Real good testimony and timely testimony. We are grateful for all 

of it. I am going to start off, Mr. Webster and Dr. Romm raised 

some serious concerns here. I don’t know if, Mr. Christian, you or 

Mr. Pietrangelo want to respond to anything that they have said. 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. Our company believes that what has worked well 

for us to achieve strength is diversity of supply. So we also believe 

that wind plays an important role, and we are engaged in deploying wind and other forms of electric power generation. We also 

strongly believe that Americans need to become more energy efficient and our energy intensity as a Country is improving. That is, 

GDP per kilowatt hour consumed. We have in our company and in 

our service territory nine programs to help people conserve and to 

stimulate demand-side management. 

That said, I think some of the statistics that were cited with respect to the capabilities of wind or renewables in general to meet 

all baseload requirements frankly bring to mind the caveat that 

was inserted in some of the Civil War newspapers that said, important if true. I don’t believe it to be true that renewables can supplant other baseload forms of electric power generation, and here 

is why. I think the answer kind of falls into two or three categories. 

First, we will take reliability. Everyone knows that wind only 

blows some of the time. We have an obligation to serve, and State 

regulation comes into play as well. Our customers demand electricity all the time, when requested. Recently, in a heavily windsupplied area in Texas, ERCOT, they went into a stage two emergency when the wind did not blow when it was needed on a peak 

summer day. This was as little as 2 months ago. It is pointed out 

that wind is typically anti-correlated to peak demand. That is to 

say, that when you need it the most, it is there the least, which 

requires regulated companies, who have an obligation to serve native load, to simultaneously install gas-fired generation. If you are 

going to install gas-fired generation to meet the requirement that 

we are under to meet and serve that load, then you begin to get 

into capital inefficiencies. 

All that said, I also would like to make the point from an environmental standpoint that wind and nuclear happen to be roughly 

equivalent in terms of greenhouse gas intensity, when you take 

into account all of the energy that goes into making the device and 

all of the energy that comes out of it. Nuclear, there is much more 

energy that goes into it, but you get a lot more energy out of it over 

time. 

So taking the long view, conservation plays an important role, 

extremely important role and this Country needs to become more 

efficient. Wind is going to play an important role, because it is a 

resource that actually requires no fuel. 

But nuclear is going to be required, because even as the renewed 

licenses expire at the end of, say, 60 years of operation, that is 100 

gigawatts that will begin to peel off of the U.S. grid. If we can meet 

all of our growth and demand presently with conservation and reVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00215 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
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newables, we can’t replace that 20 percent baseload that is there 

and due to roll off as these plants age. 

Senator CARPER. All right. 

Mr. Pietrangelo, any comments at all? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. My only comment is that I thought Mr. Gilbertson answered the questions about cost. When you do rigorous 

financial analysis with a lot of sensitivity studies, at the end of the 

day, the cost will be competitive to the ratepayers. And it is too 

much comparing apples and oranges with the numbers that have 

been thrown around today about what those numbers include, what 

year they are looked at in. What is ultimately important is the 

price of electricity to be sold from those plants. The analysis that 

a bunch of companies have done, as well as some of the financial 

analysts that the costs from new nuclear will be competitive. 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. State public utility commissions will demand 

that it be demonstrated to be in the customers’ and ratepayers’ interest. 

Senator CARPER. Mr. Gilbertson, after I heard Dr. Romm testify, 

I was sitting here thinking, why would anybody, individuals or 

fund managers, want to invest money in nuclear energy, given the 

kind of picture that he painted. Again, why would they? 

Mr. GILBERTSON. The issue really is, from a financial perspective, 

the cost per megawatt-hour over the life of the project. I think Dr. 

Romm made quite a few totally valid points that we wouldn’t quarrel with at all. It is expensive on the front end, capital cost is very 

high. 

What happens with nuclear is, the hourly amorized all-in cost of 

power will be a number that today seems high. But over the life 

of the project, the number will gradually go down by 5 to 10 percent. And this is notwithstanding what might happen in the uranium market, which is a sliver of the all-in cost of nuclear, it can 

double and it is really not going to change the hourly cost by much. 

The all-in hourly cost of nuclear will be essentially a flat number 

through the life of the plant. So if you can give me something that 

produces power at 20 percent above today’s hourly cost, but tell me 

it will be flat for 30 years, that cost number is going to be ‘‘in the 

money’’ through the life of that project, by a lot. 

So the issue is getting from today to post-construction. In my 

mind, that is what the loan guarantee program is really about: 

bridging construction finance, most of all. That is the problem we 

are facing right now. 

So this is not to quarrel with the cost points: yes, the costs are 

rising; yes, it will be high in the front-end; but through the life of 

the plant, it will be much cheaper. And I am saying all of that, 

frankly, without an explicit cost to carbon. That would just make 

the nuclear cost advantage greater. 

Senator CARPER. Is the cost of electricity, say, in a coal power, 

are new coal plants, the costs of them rising as well? 

Mr. GILBERTSON. Definitely. Not as fast as nuclear, because of 

some of the bottlenecks in the supply chain. Again, I am sure Dr. 

Romm could speak to the same point. Some of the bottlenecks in 

the nuclear supply chain are a little more acute. But some of the 

bottlenecks are not. Some of the construction service companies are 

going to build coal plants the way they are going to build new 

213 

plants. As we all know, today, the ‘‘intervention’’ industry has 

made new coal plants, nearly impossible to get going. Although we 

will see, as hopefully clean coal becomes technologically more feasible. But that is a long way out. 

Senator CARPER. My time has expired and we will come back for 

a second round. 

Senator Voinovich. 

Senator VOINOVICH. If I listen to you, Mr. Gilbertson, and then 

Mr. Christian is talking about going forward, and there are a lot 

of other people who are going forward, you just wonder why are 

they going forward with these expensive new reactors to deal with 

their baseload delivery of energy. And I think Senator Carper made 

some reference to it, you have to look out at the whole situation. 

If you have coal-fired facilities, and some of them may have to be, 

old ones may have to be closed down if you are uncertain about climate change and capturing carbon and sequestering it and so 

forth, that perhaps, as they look at their prediction for the future, 

that even though this is very expensive, that this may be the best 

opportunity that they have or option in order to take care of the 

baseload. 

The other thing is that there is promotion of wind and solar to 

the extent that somehow people feel that we are going to be able 

to take care of the baseload delivery of energy in this Country with 

those. I think that is poppycock. Mr. Christian, would you like to 

comment? You are going to put a whole lot of money in this. Why 

are you doing it? 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. Again, let me say what has been good for our 

company, which is strength through diversity, I believe strongly 

would be good for our Country. We need a diverse mix of energy 

supplies and we look at and evaluate a great many of them. As I 

said, we are into wind and biofuels and coal. We have the largest 

pumped storage operation in North America. 

But what got us looking at nuclear early in the decade, in 2001, 

was a change in gas market dynamics, in that there had been a 

historic pattern in this Country where gas, which is a very precious 

fuel, natural gas, can be used for a great many things, from fertilizer production to support of industry to home heating, would 

have a peak demand in the winter time, especially when home 

heating kicked in. Then in the summer time, gas that is produced 

in the Gulf of Mexico and domestically would be pumped underground in storage facilities in the Northeastern United States, and 

then withdrawn later. 

Early in this decade, gas plants were being built all over this 

Country. We saw those dynamics changing and a competition for 

peak and mid-merit electric power generation for the historic putting gas into storage. Eventually, this leads you to believe that you 

were going to need other sources of fuel. We continue to evaluate 

advanced coal, clean coal, carbon capture, compatible coal. But we 

believe nuclear is an important asset and can’t be taken off the 

table. 

As I said, taking the long view, we know were it not for license 

renewal, that beginning next year, these nuclear plants would be 

starting to come off the line and this 100 gigawatts would slowly 

trickle away over the course of about 15 or 20 years. That equivaVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00217 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
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lency in terms of natural gas is about 5 trillion cubic feet. And this 

Country is trying to drill and find natural gas to meet its growing 

demand now. Imagine trying to do that and also find an additional 

5 TCF to replace nuclear, if it goes away. 

The coal equivalency would be about 200 million tons a year of 

coal, with the attendant issues there. 

So regardless, I think we are pursuing nuclear because we think 

it is going to make sense for the customer. We think it is economic. 

We think it offers good environmental benefits in terms of not 

emitting greenhouse gases on a greenhouse gas intensity basis, it 

is roughly the equivalent of wind power. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And no NOx, SOx, mercury or the other 

ones. 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. No NOx, SOx. Sure. So we think it is good for 

customers, good for shareholders and good for the environment. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And so you have looked at it all? I think the 

point of natural gas, we as a Nation encouraged you to use natural 

gas. It is relatively cheap and in the process of doing that, we woke 

up 1 day and found out that our natural gas costs had skyrocketed. 

We have lost our chemical industry, at least our exporting from the 

chemical industry. 

So you have to look at that and say, hey, this other is an option. 

And you are doing it with your eyes open, because I have looked 

at this. You have the loan guarantees that we are working on, and 

we are trying to get the cap removed. We had a meeting with some 

of your friends from Wall Street, and they said if you got rid of the 

cap, on this that this would help a great deal. 

We know that we need the human capital. The Chairman and I 

have had meetings on human capital. We know we are looking at 

a manufacturing capacity that we are going to need to have, and 

the people to run them and so forth. So we do know there is a lot 

of challenges here. But from Mr. Christian’s point of view and some 

others, this makes sense, and I am hoping that you guys on Wall 

Street will look at this as maybe something good to begin to help 

with. 

Just one other thing, and I am not trying to take it, maybe I am 

in a way. Mr. Webster, I understand that the press reports that on 

Monday you appeared at a hearing to testify on the State of New 

Jersey’s energy master plan, is that correct? 

Mr. WEBSTER. That is correct, Senator. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And is it true that you advocated for decommissioning all of the State’s nuclear plants and rely entirely on energy efficiency to meet the growing demand for electricity? 

Mr. WEBSTER. No, that is not quite true, actually. What I said 

was that Oyster Creek could go offline and we could meet the energy output through energy efficiency. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And you specifically mentioned Oyster 

Creek, to take it off? 

Mr. WEBSTER. That is right. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And you think that the demand could be 

freer. Because 50 percent of the power in New Jersey comes from 

nuclear power. 

Mr. WEBSTER. Yes, there are actually four, Senator, there are 

four nuclear plants in New Jersey. Oyster Creek is the smallest at 

215 

600 megawatts. The other three plants are about 1,000 megawatts 

each. We are talking about the need for energy for 2020. Two of 

those plants are not actually destined to go offline before 2020, the 

licenses, the current licenses don’t expire before 2020. One of those 

plants expires in 2017. Only Oyster Creek, the license expires next 

year. So the discussion was primarily about Oyster Creek. I pointed out at that hearing, actually, that New York City has an initiative to lower New York City’s overall energy demand by 30 percent 

by 2017, and that initiative will be self-funded. It will actually 

make more money back saved on energy than it costs by 2015. So 

we believe there is a very substantial amount of both taxpayer 

money to be saved and energy that can be saved with those kinds 

of measures. 

Senator VOINOVICH. So are you opposed to nuclear? 

Mr. WEBSTER. My background, I actually did physics in college. 

So I don’t really think it makes sense to be for or against a specific 

technology. Technology done well is great and technology done 

badly is not so great. My objective here is to make sure that when 

we deploy nuclear technology, we deploy it in a manner that is safe 

and that will give us all the ability to rely on the safety standards 

that are applied. At the moment, unfortunately, I don’t think that 

is true. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Mr. Pietrangelo, let me go back to you. When 

Senator Sanders was here, he shared with us a large photograph 

of the collapsed cooling tower at Vermont Yankee. It was noted 

that while it was not a safety issue, that kind of thing doesn’t build 

confidence in the nuclear industry. 

There was a question as to whether or not on some shortcoming 

on the part of the operator, there would be a fine in order. Since 

it was maybe not a safety issue, there was not a fine that was 

going to be handed out by the NRC. What kind of economic penalty, and I think there was some discussion that said the plant, the 

output of the plant was reduced significantly. I presume there is 

some cost to the utility when they do that. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. Absolutely. 

Senator CARPER. Could you just describe the economic penalty to 

the utility? Setting aside whether or not there is a fine by the industry, but just quantify, if you will, the economic penalty or loss 

the utility absorbs because of that kind of failure that we saw witnessed here. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. It is on the order of a half a million to a million dollars a day. 

Senator CARPER. Say that again? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. It is on the order of a half a million to a million dollars per day that the unit is offline. 

Senator CARPER. In this case, I don’t think it was offline entirely. 

It sounded like because it was an environmental issue involving 

the release of water back into a body, a larger body of water, they 

reduced the output. I think that is what they were saying. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. The current situation is they reduced the output. I think with the prior situation it did shut down and then restarted at a lower output level. 

Senator CARPER. All right. 

216 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. More broadly, Senator, the turbine and what 

we call the balance of plant at a nuclear energy facility is really 

the money side of the plant. If that is not running you are not producing electricity. It may not be safety-related, but it is certainly 

important to the reliability of the station and the generation of the 

station. That is their business, so there is a natural incentive to 

properly maintain that equipment. 

Senator CARPER. All right. 

Mr. Christian, in your testimony you mentioned that you are cooperating with General Electric Hitachi on nuclear energy for the 

design of the new North Anna reactor. This reactor is one of the 

new designs we have been talking about here, incorporating in this 

case gravity as a passive safety feature, rather than using pumps. 

I would like to know how that partnership is proceeding. Have you 

had any difficulties you could share with us? 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. I think the partnership is proceeding well at this 

time. I would comment that as the industry, as I have observed the 

performance of various vendors in this business over the last decade, I have gotten a sense of the extreme atrophy that did occur 

in the previous two decades. 

We are really trying to get this industry going from a point of 

very low capabilities, and those capabilities have been building for 

the last decade. But I will tell you at this time that we are pleased 

with our relationship with GE Hitachi. We believe Hitachi brings 

a lot to the table in the form of manufacturing and construction experience. GE certainly has a lot of base capabilities as well. 

The reactor itself is an evolutionary design that incorporates a 

lot of passive safety features that make it a significant improvement over current generation. 

Senator CARPER. Do you expect GE to start manufacturing parts 

for nuclear power plants in the U.S.? 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. I would imagine that they will. The Nuclear Energy Institute also has actually taken a significant leadership role 

in stimulating U.S. manufacturing of nuclear quality components, 

holding regional workshops around the Country in which there has 

been tremendous interest, hundreds, literally, of vendors and suppliers that are interested in getting back into nuclear manufacturing and providing good jobs. 

Senator CARPER. And when do you expect the NRC to approve 

this new GE Hitachi passive design? 

Mr. CHRISTIAN. Their technical review will be completed in August 2010, then I believe there is some time after that for hearing, 

which would support, actually, our construction schedule, our overall project schedule, which has first safety-related concrete installation in January 2012. The NRC, although much has been made 

today of, are they doing things fast enough or is the process efficient enough, let me tell you, as a safe nuclear operator, one that 

has a profound respect for the safety of the reactor core, it is in 

everyone’s interest that the technical reviewers be provided adequate time to do their jobs with utter probity. It does not concern 

me if the issues are done correctly and done one time. Because one 

of the overarching themes of Part 52 is to achieve issue preclusion 

and foreclosure, so that they don’t come up later after large capex has been expended. 

217 

So the NRC schedule does support Dominion’s project schedule, 

and under that current schedule we would begin construction in 

early 2012. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

Mr. Bell, I don’t want you to feel left out here. When you discussed future work in your written testimony, you outlined the audits that your staff will conduct during 2009 and beyond. I think 

the comment you used was, as resources permit. Do you have the 

resources needed to conduct those audits? And if not, how will you 

prioritize your workload? 

Mr. BELL. Over the last 2 years, the agency’s programs have 

grown significantly, along with additional resources. Unfortunately, 

my office has stayed the same. So unless I get additional resources, 

I am going to be hard pressed to do the mandatory work that we 

have, in addition to maintaining a focused approach enhanced coverage of NRC’s Nuclear Safety programs. We have audits planned 

in the area of nuclear safety, security, information technology and 

corporate management. I will be happy to, for the record, give you 

a list of the audits that we have planned for the future. 

Senator CARPER. We would appreciate that. 

Mr. BELL. Yes, sir. 

[The referenced information was not received at time of print.] 

Senator CARPER. Maybe one more question, Mr. Pietrangelo, then 

one for Mr. Webster, and then we will call it a day. 

Go back with us, you may have mentioned this in your testimony, I think you said that the generating capacity or capability, 

what is the term of art that you use? Operating efficiency? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. We generate about 20 percent of the—— 

Senator CARPER. No, but 91.5 percent is the—— 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. Capacity factor. 

Senator CARPER. Capacity factor. And it is now 91.5 percent, 

which is, I think, quite high. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. The industry average. 

Senator CARPER. Yes, by historical standards. My guess is in 

past years, you had some companies, some utilities who maintained 

fairly high capacity performance and others did not. But today, it 

seems to be the performance is more nearly even across the industry. Why is that? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. I think we have consolidated as an industry. 

There are many fewer operators, so we have small fleets within the 

fleet that share best practices, that benchmark each other. Senator 

Voinovich earlier mentioned the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, which seeks excellence, not just compliance with safety regulations. They share a lot of the operating experience as well. 

So it is really through a whole symbiotic set of activities from 

what INPO shares through the benchmarking that our members do 

of each other to get those best practices. I think your observation 

is absolutely correct, the whole fleet has come along to the point 

now where if you would have gone back 10 or 15 years ago, that 

91.8 would have been the top quartile of the industry’s performance. 

Senator CARPER. If you had gone back how many years ago? 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. Just a few years ago, you would have seen 

that. But when I started, back in 1989, at NEI, the industry averVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00221 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
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age capacity factor was in the 60’s, low 70’s. So that amount of improvement in the reliability of the stations really is the equivalent 

of building about another 20 to 25 new plants over that course of 

time. 

Senator CARPER. Talk if you will about economic factors and 

market forces compelling the industry to do better, setting aside 

the work of the NRC and our interest here in this Subcommittee 

in driving safety and commitment to efficiency, reliability. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. There was always a fear that with economic 

deregulation there would be some incentive to cut corners in nuclear operations. Well, the exact opposite has occurred. Because unless you are a safe generator, you are not going to generate anything at all. So that actually has made management, I think, focus 

even more heavily on the operation and the reliabilities, the efficiencies, the benchmarking we talked about earlier. I think the 

overall improvement has been stunning. 

Senator CARPER. A question for Mr. Webster, this will probably 

be the end of it and we will go have lunch. If we are lucky. 

In Chairman Klein’s testimony, he discussed the proposed legislative change that would eliminate the requirement for the NRC to 

conduct uncontested hearings. We had a little discussion on that, 

as you recall. Let me ask, do you feel that such a change is appropriate? I think I know the answer, but go ahead and let us have 

it anyway. 

Mr. WEBSTER. Well, I always hesitate to keep people from lunch 

too long, but I think the answer is absolutely not. We actually 

think that the relicensing hearings that have occurred so far have 

revealed deficiencies in the staff review of those applications and 

have certainly led to an improved safety situation. The Oyster 

Creek facility, the proposals for the safety management of that particular issue have changed five times. For the better, I mean, we 

still have a dispute about are they good enough. But they have 

changed five times for the better during that proceeding. 

At Vermont Yankee, likewise, an issue that the NRC staff had 

missed was highlighted by petitioners. Now, sometimes petitioners 

have to come up with money for experts, petitioners have to find 

lawyers. It is not easy to be a participant in one of these NRC 

hearings, and that is certainly something that we think should be 

changed and it should be made a lot easier. 

But it can’t be expected all the time that the public should devote 

their time, their energy and their money to do what really the NRC 

should be doing itself. The mandatory hearings provide some element of check on the staff. In my testimony, I quote from some 

ASLB findings in the mandatory hearings where they say the technical portions of the staff documents in the record did not support 

a finding that the staff’s review supported its decisions. And the 

ASLB went on to say the confidence in the staff’s judgment would 

have been materially improved had the more important of these 

facts been checked. But it felt bound by the Commission, which 

said they should defer to the staff. Without that instruction, the 

ASLB would have conducted a much more probing review into the 

quality of the review and reporting. 

Now, we think that a probing review of the NRC staff, the quality of their safety review and their reporting, is something the pubVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:44 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00222 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\85537.TXT VERN
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lic deserves. It should be done openly, it should be done transparently. I find it kind of hard to understand how all the members 

here could emphasize the need to build public confidence and the 

need for transparency and then in the same breath, start to eliminate one of the things, one of the few things left that actually helps 

in this regard. It should be enhanced, not reduced. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. Any other comments on this point 

before we move on? Yes, Mr. Pietrangelo. 

Mr. PIETRANGELO. If there is no contention, you can have a hearing with yourself, I suppose. But the Commission’s proposal was 

only when there were no admissible contentions for a hearing, and 

you were still required to have a mandatory hearing. There is no 

argument with having hearings when there is admissible contentions. It is when there are no admissible contentions, do you still 

have to have the hearing. 

With regard to the technical review, what is forgotten often is 

that the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards is an independent adjunct to the NRC that does a very thorough technical review of every major licensing action that the NRC takes, including 

license renewal, as well as new plants, design certifications, early 

site permits, et cetera. It is their statutory to do that. That is the 

real technical check on the staff’s work, not the ASLB’s that Mr. 

Webster is referring to. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

I would like to wrap it up, if we could. Mr. Webster, if you have 

something just really, really quick. 

Mr. WEBSTER. Very quickly, at nine reactors, neither the staff 

nor the ACRS found the problems with the metal fatigue that was 

found by petitioners. So there is a role for hearings. The quotes I 

gave were from a non-contested hearing. There are lots of issues 

to deal with, even at non-contested hearings. So it is simply untrue 

that these uncontested hearings are just pro forma. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you all very, very much. This has run a 

bit longer than I anticipated, but it has been enormously helpful 

for me and I hope for others of my colleagues. Thank you for spending this time with us. 

I will close with just a thought. I spent 23 years of my life as 

a Naval flight officer, and a lot of time in airplanes, and another 

4 years before that as a midshipman. We have a big Air Force base 

in Delaware called Dover Air Force base. It is a big airlift base. We 

are a base where we have some of the largest airplanes in the 

world, called C–5s. We have a mix of aircraft called C–17s, which 

are somewhat smaller cargo aircraft. 

C–5s, the oldest of the C–5s are probably close to 40 years old. 

We have had to go through a decisionmaking process within the 

Air Force and the Pentagon and the Congress to decide whether or 

not it makes sense to take 40-year old aircraft and to change their 

engines, change their hydraulic systems, change out all kinds of 

systems in the aircraft and to fly them for another 20 or 30 or 40 

years. The Air Force actually took a number of the aircraft, one of 

them they literally tore apart, looking for fatigue and deterioration 

and all. Then a number of other aircraft they looked, they didn’t 

did a complete tear-down but gave them a very close examination. 

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The Air Force ultimately concluded that they could probably fly 

these planes, with the wings and fuselages, for another 30 or 40 

years. And the cost of fully modernizing a C–5 turned out to be 

about one-third the cost of buying a new C–17. And the capability, 

the cargo capability of the C–5 is roughly twice that of a C–17. And 

they fly further without being refueled. So it had the effect of about 

six times the airlift capability for a C–5 as opposed to a new C– 

17. 

There are some people in the Air Force who want to get rid of 

the C–5s, send them off to the bone yard. They didn’t call them 

rust buckets, but they said they were old, they were aging, they 

were older than the people who fly them and all. Sometimes, if we 

maintain an aircraft well, it can exceed our expectations. If we 

don’t, and if they are poorly designed, they won’t exceed our expectations or even meet our expectations. 

So as we go forward, that may be an example for us to keep in 

mind. We are going to modernize the C–5s, at least the C–5Bs, and 

hopefully they will fly safely for another 30 or 40 years, and provide cost-effective airlift. And hopefully we will get that kind of use 

out of our nuclear power plants. God knows we have invested 

enough in them. It will be comforting to know that we are going 

to continue to benefit from them for some time to come. 

Again, my thanks to each of you for your patience, for staying 

here today, for your preparation, for your responses to our questions. With that, this hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 1:32 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. LAMAR ALEXANDER, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE

STATE OF TENNESSEE

With gasoline rising above $4 per gallon and oil selling for more than $140 per 

barrel, I believe the best way for Congress to lower gasoline prices is a strategy 

based on these four words: ‘‘find more, use less.’’ Congress already took two steps 

last year toward ‘‘using less’’ when it enacted the Energy Independence and Security 

Act (EISA) in 2007, which increased the average fuel efficiency standards for cars 

and light duty trucks to 35 miles per gallon by 2020 and increased the Renewable 

Fuel Standard to 36 billion gallons by 2022. 

The Renewable Fuel Standard target of 36 billion gallons is the equivalent of 1.6 

million barrels of oil per day. The Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) included in EISA 

and tax incentives in the recently enacted farm bill have begun to accelerate our 

nation’s transition from corn-based ethanol to cellulosic ethanol—in other words, 

shifting the focus from crops we eat to crops we don’t eat. 

Just as there were possible unintended impacts on food prices from the use of 

corn-based ethanol, EPA should be alert to any potential unintended consequences 

as the country shifts to cellulosic ethanol, particularly of the effect of the RFS’s sustainability criteria on the use of woody biomass for cellulosic ethanol and on the 

paper industry that relies on woody biomass. 

In Tennessee, Governor Bredesen has instituted a comprehensive program to encourage cellulosic ethanol production from switchgrass. With these types of initiatives to produce advanced ethanol from sources other than food stocks, I am hopeful 

that the RFS will continue to play an important role in diversifying the nation’s 

transportation fuels and in putting downward pressure on gasoline prices. In the 

longer term, I support moving from a RFS to a Low Carbon Fuel Standard which 

is technology neutral and encourages more alternative fuels, such as electricity in 

plug-in electric cars and trucks and hydrogen. 

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Æ